Comparing system reliability considering insufficient knowledge: Application to HVDC converter stations

The authors describe and apply a reliability evaluation approach for comparison of the reliability respectively availability of different types of HVDC converter stations taken into account limited statistical data, insufficient information, and differences in technology. To overcome these difficulties the idea of MIL-HDBK-217F ("Part Count Reliability Prediction"), established for electronic and microelectronic devices based on "well-defined" components and well-known base failure rates, is applied in a similar sense to HVDC converter stations. Nevertheless, differences of such two distinct areas have been considered. The components in electric power stations are usually custom designed, and can be regarded as abstract units (macro components with possibly different technology, structure and protection), therefore, statistical data can be very limited due to data complication and compilation. The described approach is not only restricted to the described HVDC converter stations but can be regarded as a (extensible) procedure for similar problems, especially in early design stage.