Celilo Converter Station
Encyclopedia
Bonneville Power Administration
The Bonneville Power Administration is an American federal agency based in the Pacific Northwest. BPA was created by an act of Congress in 1937 to market electric power from the Bonneville Dam located on the Columbia River and to construct facilities necessary to transmit that power...
, is the northern terminus of the Pacific DC Intertie, near The Dalles
The Dalles, Oregon
The Dalles is the largest city and county seat of Wasco County, Oregon, United States. The name of the city comes from the French word dalle The Dalles is the largest city and county seat of Wasco County, Oregon, United States. The name of the city comes from the French word dalle The Dalles is...
, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
, in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
.
History
The Celilo Converter Station was originally configured with six groups of six-pulse mercury arc valveMercury arc valve
A mercury-arc valve is a type of electrical rectifier used for converting high-voltage or high-current alternating current into direct current . Rectifiers of this type were used to provide power for industrial motors, electric railways, streetcars, and electric locomotives, as well as for...
s with a blocking voltage
Voltage
Voltage, otherwise known as electrical potential difference or electric tension is the difference in electric potential between two points — or the difference in electric potential energy per unit charge between two points...
of 133 kV each (for a total of +/-400 kV) and a maximum current
Electric current
Electric current is a flow of electric charge through a medium.This charge is typically carried by moving electrons in a conductor such as wire...
of 2,000 ampere
Ampere
The ampere , often shortened to amp, is the SI unit of electric current and is one of the seven SI base units. It is named after André-Marie Ampère , French mathematician and physicist, considered the father of electrodynamics...
s.
In 1985 two six-pulse valve groups of thyristor
Thyristor
A thyristor is a solid-state semiconductor device with four layers of alternating N and P-type material. They act as bistable switches, conducting when their gate receives a current trigger, and continue to conduct while they are forward biased .Some sources define silicon controlled rectifiers and...
s were added in order to increase the voltage to 500 kV per pole for a total differential voltage of 1,000 kV.
In 1989 two new 1,100 ampere, 500 kV thyristor converters were added in parallel with the two existing converters, giving a total transmission power of 3,100 Megawatts (3,100 Amperes at +/-500 kV).
Until September 2001
September 11, 2001 attacks
The September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks (also referred to as September 11, September 11th or 9/119/11 is pronounced "nine eleven". The slash is not part of the pronunciation...
, the Celilo Converter Station was partially open to the public
Public
In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individuals, and the public is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the Öffentlichkeit or public sphere. The concept of a public has also been defined in political science,...
and included displays describing the history of DC
Direct current
Direct current is the unidirectional flow of electric charge. Direct current is produced by such sources as batteries, thermocouples, solar cells, and commutator-type electric machines of the dynamo type. Direct current may flow in a conductor such as a wire, but can also flow through...
transmission
Electric power transmission
Electric-power transmission is the bulk transfer of electrical energy, from generating power plants to Electrical substations located near demand centers...
and the Pacific Intertie, but security
Security
Security is the degree of protection against danger, damage, loss, and crime. Security as a form of protection are structures and processes that provide or improve security as a condition. The Institute for Security and Open Methodologies in the OSSTMM 3 defines security as "a form of protection...
concerns have closed this facility to the public.
In 2004, the mercury arc valves groups were replaced with light-triggered thyristor groups to eliminate the environmental risks of mercury
Mercury (element)
Mercury is a chemical element with the symbol Hg and atomic number 80. It is also known as quicksilver or hydrargyrum...
and to reduce the maintenance
Maintenance, Repair and Operations
Maintenance, repair, and operations or maintenance, repair, and overhaul involves fixing any sort of mechanical or electrical device should it become out of order or broken...
costs of the obsolete mercury arc valves.
Related structures
There was also a DC test facility for testing high voltageHigh voltage
The term high voltage characterizes electrical circuits in which the voltage used is the cause of particular safety concerns and insulation requirements...
equipment nearby (now abandoned, soon to be demolished). At the end of the 1960s, a test transmission line for 1,333 kV was erected in order to test equipment for this voltage, which was to be used for a planned HVDC from Celilo Converter Station to Hoover Dam
Hoover Dam
Hoover Dam, once known as Boulder Dam, is a concrete arch-gravity dam in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River, on the border between the US states of Arizona and Nevada. It was constructed between 1931 and 1936 during the Great Depression and was dedicated on September 30, 1935, by President...
. This line, however, was never built.