IEEMA – Indian Electrical & Electronics Manufacturers’ Association – the representative of Indian electrical, industrial electronics & allied products industry, organized CABLEWIRE 2011, a 2-day Seventh International Technical Conference on Cables & Wires on 17-18 November 2011, at Hotel Intercontinental The Lalit, Mumbai, India. With its theme – “Powering Growth through Innovations”, the conference focused on new/improved technology trends in manufacturing, developments of new insulating materials, condition monitoring & online assessment, new techniques for installations & maintenance, enhanced safety aspects, developments in cable accessories etc.

Around 235 delegates from users, manufacturing industry, research & development and testing institutions, raw materials manufacturers, attended the conference. The delegates from 10 countries – Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Japan, Singapore, The Netherlands, UAE, USA and India, were participated giving international flavour to the conference.

Inauguration

Mr. Vijay Karia, Chairman, CABLEWIRE 2011 organizing Committee conveyed the purpose of organizing the conference along with the synopsis of T&D scenario and challenges faced by the cable industry.

The India’s installed generation capacity is around 182,000 MW, further by March 2012 the presumed capacity to be added will be 28,000 MW as per the 11th five year plan. Being a carrier of electricity our role occupies a vital importance in curtailing the T&D losses faced by the country. Any lacking or delays on our side will have a catastrophic affect on the country’s sustainable growth. The economic and environmental impact on our country where more than 60% of the generation is thermal would be unimaginable and we as an individual or as an industry will not be isolated from the cascading effect of the economic & environmental disasters looming over us if we fail to act now. The present infrastructure of India for 1.2 billion people out of which major percentage of people doesn’t have the access to the electricity is grossly inadequate. The pressure to modernize the Indian infrastructure is tremendous and honestly no other country other than India can meet or absorb more than USD 500 billion of investment.

Highlighting the challenges for the cable industry he said, “The cable industry by far has its own set of problems where intensive competition drives pressure and leads to the situation where survival becomes tough. The T&D loss this year would be around 60,000 MW. Further these can be reduced by using good quality of wires and cables. We as an industry and you as an audience/user/stakeholder of this industry can all help not only in reducing the losses but also saving lives of people, saving valuable foreign exchange and helping the country to grow and meet it’s the targeted GDP. Moreover, this is plagued by the other reasons at the moment like excessive capacities, rising interest cost, fluctuating commodity price, more than 40,000 permutation & combination in sizes and specifications of cables that are being manufactured in the country, 58 utilities – 58 different sets of specifications, a commoditized approach of buyers to the product and to the industry. Our motto is simple: when in doubt, communicate; when in pain, act.”

Mr. Vimal Mahendru

Mr. Vimal Mahendru, Immediate Past President – IEEMA, addressed the audience highlighting the growth of electrical industry and activities of IEEMA. He assured the dignitaries present from Utilities that Indian electrical industry was capable of meeting today’s growing demand and there would not be any compromise for quality of the product. He invited all to visit ELECRAMA 2011, where they could see all electrical equipment under one roof.

Shri Suresh Prabhu

Shri Suresh Prabhu – Former Union Cabinet Minister for Power, GoI, inaugurated the conference. While focusing on the development of power sector after reform in 2002, he emphasized on the need of sub-transmission & distribution network to evacuate the power and supply it to the end consumer. He also mentioned the need of revival of distribution companies and making the distribution commercially viable. Based on the inputs from the industry and other stakeholders, he added that, it was necessary to have the policies in place that would boost the growth of the industry as well. He appreciated the important role played by IEEMA in past few years, which provided the inputs to the government from time-to-time and he further expected similar contribution & support by IEEMA in future.

Mr. M.K. Deore

Keynote speaker – Mr. M.K. Deore, Director (Projects), Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Ltd., gave broad picture of network & working of MSEDCL and their effort of reducing distribution losses from 29.6% in 2006-07 to 17.28% in 2010-11. Mr. Arun Sachdeva, General Manager (Tech. Services), North Delhi Power Ltd. also addressed the audience on this occasion.

Mr. Bharat Jaisinghani – Member, CABLEWIRE 2011 organizing committee proposed a vote of thanks expressing his gratitude on the behalf of IEEMA for dignitaries, authors, session chairmen, delegates, supporters etc. present at the conference.

Total 21 papers were presented during 2 days of the Conference. Out of these, 8 papers were from overseas on the following topics:

• Improved technology trends in manufacturing

• Developments of new insulating materials

• Condition monitoring & online assessment

• Techniques for installations & maintenance and enhancing safety aspects

• Cable accessories – Developments

• Users’ experiences

On the 1st day of the Conference, three sessions covered 11 papers. The officials from the following organizations presented papers:

• Borealis Polymers N.V, Belgium

• Borouge Pte., Singapore

• Central Power Research Institute

• CESC Ltd.

• Electric Research & Development Association

• Frontier Technologies Pvt. Ltd.

• J-Power Systems Corporation, Japan

• Nuclear Power Corporation of India Ltd.

• Power Plus Cable Co. LLC, UAE

• Prysmian Cables and Systems B.V., The Netherlands

• Prysmian PowerLink Srl, Italy

• Raychem RPG Pvt. Ltd.

The second day started with Surprise snippets – presenting the views of the participants about the Conference. Mr. Vijay Karia welcomed the guest and gave his opening remark. Keynote speaker – Mr. S.K. Negi, Managing Director, Gujarat Electricity Transmission Company Ltd. put forth the important facts & figures of generation, transmission, distribution and the challenges faced presently and in near future by these sub-sector which are dependent on each other. Invited guest speaker – Mr. M.S. Rao, Sr. Vice President & Head – Mumbai Transmission, Reliance Infrastructure Ltd., touched upon the subject of “Urban Transmission”; highlighting the challenges & possible solutions for distribution companies to reach to their customers with uninterrupted and quality supply of electricity.

Technical Sessions

On the second day, three sessions were conducted and the papers were presented by the officials of the following organisations:

• Central Power Research Institute

• Government College of Engineering, Aurangabad

• Institute of Chemical Technology

• Kalpena Industries Ltd.

• Nexans Asia-Pacific, Singapore

• Paschim Gujarat Vij Company Ltd.

• Prysmian PowerLink Srl, Italy

• Raychem RPG Pvt. Ltd.

• Universal Cables Ltd.

• VISCAS Corporation, Japan