Season greetings 2019 from Russian National Committee of CIGRE

Dear Colleagues,

I would like to send you my greetings on your professional holiday – Power Engineers’ Day, the upcoming New Year and Christmas!

It took just over a century for electricity not only to enter every home and every production site but also to continue expanding into industries traditionally dominated by other energy sources such as motor vehicles and even aviation. Today, electric power is a casual good and, without exaggeration, an infrastructural basis of the economy.

A key to this is the possibility of transmitting the power over long distances: from generation facilities to the largest consumers and distribution networks. In 2019, we celebrated the 65^th anniversary of Long Distance Power Transmissions. Today its traditions are inherited by Federal Grid Company (Rosseti Group, FGC UES), which is responsible for uninterrupted operation and development of the Unified National Power Grid.

Historically, almost since the inception of the industry, serious attention has been paid to international scientific and technological cooperation. In 1920, the State Commission for Electrification of Russia (GOELRO) was established, in 1921 the International Association of CIGRE began its work in France, and in 1923 the USSR was already actively involved in its work. The rate of cooperation development is still high.

This year has been busy but very fruitful for Russian NC of CIGRE.

The Reporting Conference summarizing the 47^th CIGRE Session was held on April 17. It was focused on the world experience of digital technologies implementation in power systems. Besides, this is the first time we assessed the level of activity of Association members in terms of KPI. The scale of activity is impressive. In two years, 587 scientific papers were published, of which almost 200 (199) were in international journals. 32 books were published. 14 international and 65 all-Russian events were organized. On December 11, in the framework of the final meeting with the heads of the leading scientific and technical partners, incentive certificates were awarded to the leaders of the rating

On July 2-4, the Second International Conference "Digital Substation. Standard IEC 61850. Digitalization of Power Networks" was held at the R&D Center of FGC UES with the support of CIGRE National Committees of Russia and of the Netherlands. More than two hundred experts from Russia, CIS countries, the Netherlands, Germany and Austria heard about 40 reports summarizing Russian and international experience in implementing digital technologies based on the IEC standard. As part of the Conference, R&D Center of FGC UES and MPEI signed an agreement to establish a core department of cyber security and information technology.

On September 10-11, with the participation of the plant "Izolyator", the 25^th Anniversary Science-to-practice Conference Focused on Production, Use, Diagnostics and Repair of High-voltage Feeds and Measuring Transformers was held. Russian, Chinese and Polish experts as well as representatives of the Kyrgyz Ministry of Energy took active part in the event.

During the Russian Energy Week in October, with the support of the Russian Ministry of Energy, we presented CIGRE for the first time on a politically significant platform. Under the auspices of the Association, a panel session "The Evolution of Energy Systems: A Global Perspective" was organized.

The key event of the expiring year is, of course, the Joint Meeting of the Governing Bodies of CIGRE, Steering Committee and Technical Council, in St. Petersburg. This was the first time Russia hosted such an event, and I must say that we have received the most positive feedback.

Just a few days earlier, Fyodor Opadchiy, as the President of the Association of the Largest System Operators GO15, held the 16^th Annual Meeting of the Association.

In late November (November 19-20) a rather large-scale Conference of the National Study Committee A1 "Rotating Electrical Machines" was held, devoted to predictive diagnostics of high-voltage rotating machines. I thank Moscow Power Engineering Institute, which was a partner in the event. It is worth mentioning that representatives of the equipment operation units showed their greatest interest in the conference. I believe that other committees of the Russian NC also should pay attention to predictive diagnostics and condition-based repairs for a wider range of equipment.

Finally, another "premiere" of this year was the first meeting of the Discussion Club "Women in Engineering", which was held with the participation of Deputy Energy Minister Anastasia Bondarenko. This may sound unusual to us, but holding events with a women's agenda as well as the proportion of women in national committees are very strong parameters on which CIGRE evaluates the activities of National Committees.

Now a few words about the plans for 2020. Our main task is to worthily represent Russia at the 48^th Session of CIGRE in Paris. We are still the fifth largest National Committee in the world by number of members, succeeding only to China, USA, Japan and Brazil.

By the number of abstracts adopted for the 2020 Session, we are the fourth. 36 papers from Russian authors were approved. Only China, Brazil and the US are ahead of us.

You may remember that our delegation at the last Session was the sixth largest in the world. 17 companies attended the exhibition, 5 international agreements were signed. Like at the last Session, Russian NC is planning to build a collective exposition, and I encourage members of the Association to take a more active part.

In addition to the traditional participation in the scientific, business and exhibition program, at the 48^th Session for the first time Russia is responsible for organizing almost all NGN events. Russian NC is also planning to make a speech at the CIGRE Women's Forum.

I also would like to mention the International Conference and Exhibition "Relay Protection and Automation for Electric Power Systems 2020", traditionally organized by the System Operator with the support of the Ministry of Energy of Russia, Russian NC, FGC UES and RusHydro, which will be held in Moscow on May 26-28. CIGRE Secretary General Philippe Adam will attend the event.

Dear friends, Power Engineers' Day is a tribute to strong and responsible people for whom reliability is a part of the profession. I wish you to match this title always and in all respects. I wish you success, good health, and trouble-free work!

CIGRE Russian NC Chairman
Andrey E. Murov