Field Services
We provide field services to modernize and extend the useful life of aging electrical infrastructure. As an alternative to the complete replacement of your electrical equipment, field services can help you achieve significant cost savings attributed to capital project expenditure as well as to reduce the downtime associated with equipment change over.
Quality components tend to exhibit a long service life. Well maintained electrical equipment is often in good condition but may lack modern functionalities that could be benefiting you. Instead of costly equipment replacement and extended downtime to achieve your desired functionalities, we can design and implement turnkey, retrofit solutions to provide you enhanced benefits such as improved protection, improved reliability, and SCADA integration that was previously not available. Not only does our manufacturing expertise help you extend the useful life of electrical equipment, our retrofit services will also save you on capital expenses, reduce construction duration, and minimize downtime of your critical facility operations.
Our core competencies:
Industrial electrical distribution systems consist of complex equipment that supply power to various facility loads. Such electrical equipment is vital to maintain your production, process, and revenue stream. We can help inspect and objectively analyze the condition of your existing electrical infrastructure to determine which of our core competencies best suits your needs. Well maintained systems can benefit from retrofits that offer useful life extension. Electrical sub-systems can be made more reliable and robust by retrofitting components that have a known ‘bad track record. Other types of field services offer modernization of the existing power system, which improve system protection or establish means of monitoring via SCADA. Some modernizations also allow existing switchgear or other apparatus to comply with the latest requirements of NEC or NFPA 70E. Retrofitting to provide arc flash mitigation is one of the most common field service tasks. Other such examples include:
Protective Device Upgrades. Replacement of existing electromechanical relays, solid-state protective relays, and trip units with digital multi-function devices can deliver enhanced protection such as zone-selective interlocking, high-speed differential relaying, trip coil monitoring, event recording, synchrophasor trending, and fault locating.
Enhanced System Controls. Modification of existing hardwired AC/DC controls with PLC or PAC overlay schemes can establish complex load shed & load adds schemes during generator operation as well as automatic source transfer schemes such as the transfer to alternate sources in the event of a utility outage, closed-transition utility restoration, or seek the live source capability.
SCADA Integration. Modification of existing electrical control circuits can establish integration with a remote SCADA system for monitoring electrical system conditions and establish data exchange for real-time electrical system trending and to validate overall functionality.
Equipment Upgrades. Retrofit of existing motor control center lineups, variable frequency drives, and control systems associated with industrial facilities can ensure the functionality of upgraded process equipment such as pumps, boilers, conveyors, mixers, fans, cranes, propulsion systems, and other types of heavy machinery.
Equipment Enhancements. Retrofit of existing switchgear lineups, rectifiers, frequency converters, and associated components can establish functionality associated with modifications and upgrades undertaken to AC and DC traction power systems used in railway electrification.
Power System Enhancements. Retrofit of existing switchgear lineups with modified controls and intertie protection schemes can establish electrical connectivity with renewable ‘green power’ sources such as solar photovoltaic, cogeneration, or combined heat & power (CHP) systems.
A representational list of our field service projects:
Water & Wastewater Facilities
- Patapsco Wastewater Treatment Plant – Baltimore, MD
- Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant – Baltimore, MD
- Front Royal Wastewater Treatment Plant – Front Royal, VA
Data Centers
- Fannie Mae Worldgate Center – Herndon, VA (Learn More)
- AIG Data Center – Reston, VA
- SABEY Data Center – Ashburn, VA
Facility Generation, Distribution, and System Automation
- BCUA Cogeneration Facility – Hackensack, NJ (Learn More)
- Quantico Marine Corps Base – Quantico, VA
- Intelsat G30 Facilities – Washington DC
Our blogs related to field services:
Testimonials from our field service clients:
“Helios was tasked to replace a 40-year old switchgear and to design a new state the art substation along with a generator system for a large wastewater treatment plant. To complete the cutover from old to new construction, it was necessary to disconnect the old power connections, reconnect to the new utility then test everything without forcing us to experience any electrical outages. This required installing a new substation adjacent to the old substation while paralleling both the old and new substation as well as being able to use the plants’ backup generator in the event power was interrupted from the utility. The Helios team worked with us every step of the way from design to commissioning and completing all work on time and most of all on budget.”
Municipal Client (Southern Virginia)
“I have to give a special thanks to Helios Electric that I brought onboard as without their help and also quickness in reviewing the OEM drawings, identifying its errors, working up a complete main-tie-main scheme quickly with the info provided, and getting us something that we could work with; timely completion could not have happened. With their meticulous direction on site we were confident that the job could get done.”
Electrical Contractor (Reston, VA)