Client

The University of Kent’s 300-acre campus is a small self-contained town with over 20,000 students and over 4,000 staff. There are accommodation blocks, teaching and administrative buildings and a wide range of support facilities including restaurants, a cinema, nightclub, medical facilities, research facilities, a nursery, sports halls, and bus stops.

Challenge

The University of Kent aims to be a globally recognised research institution with a resilient network. Our dedicated engineers and technical staff work closely with the university’s facilities department to ensure that this is achieved, supported by prompt reporting and feedback to the department.

The campus comprises 25 high voltage (HV) substations and 25 transformers, 40 pieces of switchgear and the associated HV and low voltage (LV) cables connecting from the main 11kV intake.

Approach and innovation

Our approach to performance management and improvement is based on collaboration (ISO44001) with a shared ambition to ensure the safe, resilient and efficient operation of their business. This also includes optimising the maintenance programme to minimise outages and any disruption.

We are working to replace ageing infrastructure and to improve security of supply and resilience while reducing the risk of a network failure. This includes replacing ageing oil filled switchgear and overlaying aged cables. This not only benefits the university by helping them achieve their environmental goals but also has lower maintenance requirements and a higher reliability factor.

We provide the university with impartial technical advice on the existing distribution system to ensure they are operating safely and efficiently.

We purchase in excess of £700 million of goods and services for electrical infrastructure per annum. We have built extensive long-term relationships with all the major equipment manufacturers. This enables us to share the benefits of cost, lead-time and customer service with the university.

Outcome

Our collaborative relationship with The University of Kent exists at multiple levels between our organisations, and we have been working with the university to achieve their energy and growth targets. We share our extensive experience in operating some of the UK’s most critical private networks with the University of Kent which helps them implement best practice and improve the level of resilience across their electrical network.