Jarle Vikør Ekanger
Instrumentation Engineering Specialist, MSc, PhD
I find solutions for instrumentation and signal acquisition in power plants and similar industrial environments. Being part of the software development team in FDB also means I have the entire dataflow from sensor to end-user data storage in mind when forming my solutions.
In FDB I have been a key part of the data acquisition gateway “Hydrocord Server” since its beginning. With good colleagues, I’m proud to have developed a model that retains metadata for data users throughout the dataflow at the same time as it provides live data across several network security levels.
Work Experiences
- Instrumentation Engineering Specialist, FDB ( 2016 ->)
- Fellow at NTNU -PhD, FDB (2011 - 2016)
Education
PhD “Investigation of the relationship between water quality variations and cavitation occurrence in power plants”
NTNU, 2016:26 http://hdl.handle.net/11250/2381870
2011 – 2016
“Morphing skins to improve local flow behavior in a hydroturbine context” NTNU http://hdl.handle.net/11250/234337
Skills
Professional Skills
- NI LabVIEW (NI FPGA)
- AutoDesk Inventor
- Arduino
- PCSchematic
- Visual Basic for Applications
Publications
- Detection of Draft Tube Surge and Erosive Blade Cavitation in a Full-Scale Francis Turbine, Journal of Fluids Engineering Jan 2015-011103
Portfolio
HydroCord
FDB, 2017-2025
HydroCord is a holistic data acquisition and monitoring solution for hydro power plants. HydroCord ensures cyber security by utilizing a data diode in data transport from an air-gapped secure zone to a less secure zone. In the Sira-Kvina installation, several power plants are monitored using a range of data acquisition techniques, and all data is made available in a time series database that can be viewed in Grafana.
My role in HydroCord:
SW engineer for the development of FDBs data-acquistion solution, HydroCord.
- Programming activities from maintenance of FDBs “modular architecture”, on which HydroCord is based, to development of new features.
- Development of database solutions and database-HMIs for data-flows generated by hydropower operators.
- Lead developer for analysis plugin- functionality.
AFC4Hydro
EU Horizon 2020, 2019-2023
The overall objective of the AFC4Hydro research project is to design, implement and validate in full-scale water turbine an active flow control system that permit to increase efficiency and reduce the dynamics loads on the structure at any off-design operating conditions and during transient operations.
Specifically, the system will modify the draft tube flow field to mitigate or supress the pressure fluctuations induced by the vortical flow which limits the operation of actual hydraulic machines. Special attention will be given to the flow instability leading to the formation of the vortex rope in the draft tube.
A combination of two innovative technologies will be used in the draft tube:
- injection of pulsating momentum (IPM) with a specific frequency, amplitude and phase by means of actuators;
- injection of continuous momentum (ICM) in the form of water jets with controlled speed and orientation directed against the swirling flow.
The IPM handles the problem at its source, while the ICM is the remedy when the problem arises. A structural health monitoring (SHM) system will be developed to continuously evaluate the performance of the turbine in real time and used as a feedback to adjust the flow control strategy with a specifically designed Controller. This closed loop configuration will permit to enhance the stability of the flow and decrease the level of unsteadiness also during transients such as ramp up and ramp down.
My role:
Head of instrumentation.
Responsible for HW-SW solutions for data acquisition and control. Development and construction of solution for laboratory and fields tests. Several field trips involving start-up of systems and eventual troubleshooting.
Cavitation monitoring
UPC, 2011-2016
Together with a hydropower operator and U of Catalonia- Barcelona (UPC).
Development and implementation of innovative cavitation monitoring device for the hydropower business. The solution can be applied in any flow system experiencing cavitation.
