The new 110 kV Huiquan substation has recently been put into operation in Zaozhuang city, in East China's Shandong province, which has significantly contributed to the digital and intelligent transformation of the local power grid.

The 81 secondary systems of the Huiquan substation are all equipped with domestically produced chips, making it the first of its kind in the city and a key part of its steady and safe power supply.

Since the beginning of last year, the State Grid Corp of China has been committed to promoting the use of domestically produced chips, to improve upon the unfavorable situation before when most chips in traditional substations were produced by foreign manufacturers, said Zhou Guoqing, construction director of the State Grid's Zaozhuang Power Supply Co, the substation's main operator.

The Huiquan substation is also the first in the city to support remote modification of "protection settings", said Xu Qinchao, who has worked in the power supplier's Operation and Maintenance Department for almost 13 years.

"In the past, we had to send five or six employees to drive dozens of miles and work for almost half of a day, just to make some minor modifications," said Xu. "Now all we need to do is hit the keyboard."

The new feature has reduced the time it takes to modify "protection settings", from three hours to five minutes, which has greatly improved the company's efficiency, Xu added.