Isochronous load sharing · Automatic dispatch · Feeder-priority load shedding
Generation, switchgear, and controls have to behave as one system.
Innova Technologies engineers load and power management systems that coordinate paralleled generators, dispatch available generation against station demand and spinning reserve, manage feeder-priority load shedding, and support transitions between utility-connected and islanded operation.
The result is a coordinated power management strategy built around the generation assets, electrical system, operating priorities, and contingencies of the facility.
Control
Each generator has controls that regulate speed, load, voltage, and machine operation. What an individual generator controller cannot determine on its own is how an entire facility should allocate load, when another machine should be started, which breaker should close, how much reserve should be maintained, or which loads should be shed if generation is lost.
Those are plant-level decisions.
Innova Technologies engineers the control layer that coordinates them.
Isochronous load sharing distributes real power across paralleled generating units. Automatic dispatch brings machines online or offline according to station demand, operating requirements, and spinning reserve. Synchronizing and breaker-control logic coordinate connections to the bus or utility. Under-frequency load shedding with feeder-priority management protects the electrical system when available generation suddenly decreases.
The same control philosophy can also coordinate reactive load, utility interchange, island operation, large motor starts, peak shaving, demand response, renewable generation, and broader plant power management requirements.
The Problem
A facility operating its own generation does not have an unlimited electrical grid behind it.
If a generator trips, the remaining machines have to absorb the change. A large motor start can create a meaningful frequency or voltage disturbance. Losing a utility connection can instantly change the operating requirements of every generator still online. When generator controls, switchgear, protection systems, and plant controls are supplied as separate systems, much of that coordination can fall to operators and operating procedures.
Hybrid generation adds another layer. Diesel or gas generation, wind, solar PV, and battery energy storage do not respond to changing load in the same way. Available renewable generation can change quickly, while dispatchable generation still has to maintain sufficient capacity and reserve to support the facility.
A properly engineered load management system brings those decisions together. Dispatch, spinning reserve, switching, load shedding, large-load management, and operating modes are coordinated around the electrical behavior and priorities of the site. This allows the facility to carry the generation it actually needs, maintain the reserve appropriate for its operating conditions, and respond predictably when the electrical system changes.
Capabilities
Innova can coordinate real-power sharing across multiple generators operating in parallel, allowing the generating fleet to maintain frequency while distributing load according to the capabilities of the individual machines. Mixed generating fleets can be accommodated, including gas turbines, steam turbines, hydro turbines, reciprocating engines, and other prime movers. Load-sharing strategies are engineered around factors such as machine capability, minimum loading, operating limits, and load acceptance characteristics. Transfer between isochronous and droop operating modes can also be coordinated with utility-tie status and the site's operating philosophy.
When available generation falls below connected demand, the electrical system has to rebalance quickly. Innova engineers under-frequency load shedding with feeder-priority management so the facility determines in advance which loads can be removed and in what order. Priority groups are developed around the site's operational requirements and critical-load hierarchy. The resulting logic can then be verified during factory testing before the system is commissioned in the field.
Power management extends beyond generator dispatch. It brings generation, switchgear status, electrical distribution, operating modes, alarms, and plant-level visibility into one coordinated control strategy. Innova can engineer plant-level automation that coordinates generator dispatch, breaker status, switching sequences, interlocks, alarms, remote I/O, load priorities, and operator commands across the facility. The scope can include interfaces with low- and medium-voltage switchgear such as generator feeders, transformer feeders, bus sections, bus couplers, neutral grounding systems, MCCs, and outgoing feeders. Operators can be given a consolidated view of generation availability, bus status, breaker positions, station load, spinning reserve, alarms, and power-management modes through the plant control environment. Power management, process control, and safety instrumented functions can remain appropriately separated while still exchanging the information required for coordinated operation. This architecture allows Innova to address power management as a plant-wide electrical control function, not simply as an extension of the individual generator controls.
Automatic dispatch helps determine which generators should operate as station demand changes. Innova can develop dispatch strategies that account for available generation, station load, required spinning reserve, machine availability, operating priorities, run hours, and standby assignments. Spinning reserve can be calculated and presented to operators as a live operating value, giving the plant visibility into how much additional generation is actually available if demand increases or an operating unit is lost.
Innova can perform the engineering required to develop a load-shedding strategy, including evaluation of generation, connected load, feeder priorities, and the operating conditions the system must withstand. Where the customer or another engineering firm has already completed the electrical distribution study, Innova can also work from that supplied information and implement the required control strategy. The scope is established according to the needs of the project rather than assuming the study must originate from one party.
Where black-start capability is required, Innova can engineer sequencing to restore generation and electrical loads without an external power source. A restoration sequence can include starting the initial generating unit, energizing a dead bus, restoring essential loads, bringing additional generation online, and progressively reconnecting plant loads within the operating limits of the generating equipment. The sequence is developed around the facility's generation assets, electrical architecture, and restoration priorities.
Where the facility's operating strategy or utility arrangement calls for it, Innova can support peak shaving and demand-response applications as part of the power management system. Generation can be dispatched according to site demand, utility import limits, operating targets, or external signals while maintaining appropriate generation and reserve margins. The specific strategy is engineered around the facility's electrical system, commercial requirements, utility arrangement, and generation capabilities.
Large electrical loads can create significant disturbances on isolated or limited-capacity power systems. Innova can coordinate the addition of large loads against available generation and reserve. Starting permissives, load sequencing, and generator dispatch can be used to prevent multiple high-demand loads from being added simultaneously or to bring additional generation online before the load is applied. This allows the system to account for large-load events as part of normal plant operation rather than leaving operators to manage them manually.
Facilities increasingly operate with a mixture of dispatchable generation and renewable or stored energy. Innova can integrate visibility and supervisory control for wind generation, solar PV, and battery energy storage alongside conventional generation. Battery interfaces can include information such as availability and state of charge where required by the application. Bringing these resources into the same power-management environment allows dispatch and reserve strategies to respond to the actual generation available to the plant.
Innova can coordinate generator synchronizing, breaker sequencing, and close permissives across multiple generating units and electrical buses. The control strategy can include dead-bus and live-bus logic, synchronism checking, breaker sequencing, and interfaces with the protective devices responsible for electrical protection. Protection remains within the dedicated protection system, while the management layer handles plant-level sequencing, operating decisions, status, and operator interaction.
Load management controls can coordinate the facility's interaction with the utility as well as its operation after separation from the grid. Depending on the application, control strategies can regulate utility import, export, or other interchange targets. If the tie is lost, generating units can transition to the appropriate island operating mode while the load-shedding system responds to any immediate generation deficit. Planned separation and resynchronization can also be incorporated into the operating sequence.
Why Innova Technologies
Innova Technologies, formerly Petrotech, brings more than 50 years of controls experience and more than 3,500 installations involving gas turbines, steam turbines, hydro turbines, reciprocating engines, generators, compressors, and other critical equipment. That experience matters because load management depends on more than electrical calculations.
Different prime movers accept and reject load differently. Their operating limits, response characteristics, minimum-load requirements, and control strategies directly affect how a facility should dispatch generation, maintain reserve, transfer between operating modes, and respond to a disturbance. Innova combines that turbomachinery knowledge with generator control, electrical integration, switchgear interfaces, and plant-level automation to develop load and power management systems around the actual behavior of the facility.
Open Architecture Without Proprietary Lock-In
Innova has controls experience across most manufactured gas turbines, steam turbines, reciprocating engines, EMD equipment, and other power generation equipment.
That broad equipment background allows load and power management strategies to be developed around the characteristics of the installed fleet rather than around a single OEM platform.
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A MESSAGE FROM JOHN KAZOUR, CEO
To our customers and partners,
For more than 50 years, our team has helped customers keep critical operations running. We built our reputation as Petrotech by taking responsibility for control systems on important rotating machinery.
As more industries came to us with similar challenges across power generation, compression, and hydro applications, our engineering team kept finding ways to solve them. Eventually, the business outgrew the Petrotech name.
We are entering our next chapter as Innova Technologies. The new name reflects the full scope of our work as a rotating machinery control systems specialist. We engineer controls around the machine, deliver complete projects from design through commissioning, and provide support that stays with the problem until it is solved.
Our name is changing, but the people, engineering experience, and commitment behind the work continue. Our responsibility to active projects and installed systems carries forward under the Innova Technologies name. Your current contacts remain the right place to start, and we will communicate directly if an administrative record requires an update.
We appreciate the trust you have placed in us over the decades, and we look forward to continuing that work as Innova Technologies.
CEO, Innova Technologies
