Besides a general presentation from Damstra Laboratory, a guest speaker from Eaton Industries presented the Future of the DC grid. With the developments around renewable energy, electrical vehicles and local generation Eaton is one of the leading companies in the industry regarding the development of DC components and systems which will change the grid lay out dramatically.

Main topic however was the effects of a short circuit in the grid. Introduction was provided by Peter van Gestel, Test Coordinator Short Circuit laboratory at Damstra. After clarification of the main terms  he expanded his presentation to main root causes and effects of short circuits in the grid and how the IEC standards provide means to evaluate product safety in case of such power net disturbance. At the end he presented a case study; a power grid with realistic values. He challenged the students to calculate the short circuit current at certain time. That appeared to be quite a challenge.  In 5 teams the students used various approached to get to the answer; calculation, simulation and even estimation.

Without providing the correct answer the students were invited to visit the Damstra Laboratory for a tour in the Short Circuit lab. It was not an coincident of course that Damstra laboratory was able to simulate the case study circuit by use of its Generator. In real life the students could witness the effect of a short circuit.

Afterwards Peter van Gestel explained the calculation and could show the correct values compared with the measurements of the simulation