NOJA Power’s GMK passes Internal Arc Classification Testing

Australian switchgear engineers NOJA Power are celebrating the successful Internal Arc Classification (IAC) of their Ground Mount Kiosk (GMK) Switchgear product to IEC Standard 62271-200.

The GMK has been popular in deployment for renewable generation connection sites which are fenced off from the general public, but the lack of IAC testing was a limiting factor for application deployment.

With the successful type testing completed, the product is now fully compliant with the requirements for utility and private infrastructure service in the public domain.

The GMK passed IAC testing for both A Class for authorized personnel access and B classifications for general public access.

“Our GMK products have found application in restricted access sites on an increasing basis and this upgraded design that has now passed internal arc classification test for both class A, Authorized personnel access and class B Generally public access our GMK products will now find application in all applications our utility customers would like to use them,” reports NOJA Power Group Managing Director Neil O’Sullivan. “This internal arc classification testing is particularly stringent requiring indicators at 100mm from the test object on all 4 sides to guarantee the safety of the general public in the event of an arc fault. We are particularly proud of this new solution which maintains our mantra of safety first in all our products.”

The type testing was completed at the Lane Cove High Voltage Testing Station facility in Sydney, formally known as Testing and Certification Australia but now operated by PlusES.

IAC type testing is arduous for equipment installed in the public domain, and the NOJA Power GMK passed with a considerable margin. The equipment under test is surrounded by black cotton indicators of approximately 40 g/m2, which are 100mm x 100mm, Figure 1 shows the cotton indicator setup. These indicators are used to evaluate the performance of the equipment. The five key attributes are:

NOJA Power’s GMK is a ground mount variant of the companies’ OSM Recloser product. Accordingly, it is provided equipped with the integration of most protection, control and automation functionality required of the application. The popularity in renewable connection projects is the inclusion of generation specific features such as ROCOF, VVS and Synchrocheck.