DESS News

DESS Acquired by Essex Energy

25 Aug 2009

Dromey Design is pleased to announce that the DESS software package has been acquired by Essex Energy Corporation. DESS will not only continue to be supported, but there are exciting plans to expand the product offering and capability of DESS. Further details will be forthcoming so stay tuned.

The Essex DESS team will be led by John Avdoulous and both Ian Dromey and Gordon Dromey will continue to be involved with Ian assisting with the existing product and Gordon serving as a technical advisor for future product development.

DESS Update 6.1.0.36

2 Jun 2009

This release includes numerous minor changes and bug fixes plus the following:

• Correction to 3-winding transformer impedances.
• Fixes to regulator loss calculations affecting phase balancing and other optimizations.

New Support Number

23 April 2009

The number for technical support for DESS has changed.

If you need technical support or assistance with DESS please call (289) 362-1623.

DESS Update 6.1.0.35

27 Nov 2008

This is a minor maintenance release. It contains the following changes and bug fixes:

• Improvements to Import References, including easier access to standard protection data.
• Minor improvements to protection coordination displays.
• Minor changes required for running Arc Flash and Operations plugins.

DESS Update 6.1.0.34

10 Oct 2008

This release includes numerous minor changes and bug fixes plus the following:

• New specific fault analysis for finding fault infeeds and voltages for a specific fault.
• Improved load scaling tool.
• Detailed feedback if transformer or regulator tap settings are causing load flow problems.

Specific Fault Analysis

10 Oct 2008

A new analysis called the Specific Fault Analysis has been added to the short circuit analysis module. This analysis gives you the fault infeeds and voltages for a specific fault condition.

This type of analysis is very useful for setting protection devices and for determining fault conditions where multiple infeeds exist such as systems containing distributed generation.

DESS Update 6.1.0.33

4 Jul 2008

This release includes numerous minor changes and bug fixes plus the following:

• 100% support for DXF background maps - no need to convert to TAB format anymore.
• Reference data items now indicate whether they are being used or not.
• Enhanced stability for optimization analysis.

How To Videos

10 Mar 2008

Dromey Design has expanded the support section of their website to include a series of How To flash videos. These provide assistance for learning to use many of the features in DESS, including creating nodes and lines and selecting items.

Theme Legends

25 Feb 2008

The latest updates to DESS now include legends when displaying result themes. You can customize the placement and transparency of the legends.

Themes help to display results from various types of analysis to help you quickly identify areas of concern and understand general trends and conditions on your system.

DESS Update 6.1.0.31

22 Feb 2008

This release includes numerous minor changes and bug fixes plus the following:

• Improved DXF support for background maps.
• Support for ungrounded sources.
• Option to exclude open points when tracing downstream.

Custom Text Labels

11 July 2007

You can now create customized text labels for nodes and lines on the system.

You can control the font, size, placement and background color of the label. You can also choose different styles based on the underlying data. Have one label for nodes with transformers and another for nodes with switches. Labels can also be automatically shown/hidden based on the scale of the map.

Phase Balancing Analysis

2 May 2007

The latest release of DESS6 now includes Phase Balancing analysis (see DESS modules). This optimization recommends phasing changes to single phase spurs and transformers to balance three phase feeders. Balancing helps to improve power quality, increase usable feeder capacity and reduce losses.

Distributed Generation Articles

20 February 2007

There are a series of three new articles in the Articles section which describe how generation works (synchronous and induction), and how to evaluate the impact of generation on a distribution system. Useful background information for those wishing to model generation in DESS

Protection Coordination

17 May 2006

Recent releases of DESS include new tools for protection coordination. This includes accurate overcurrent modeling of fuses and relays, and allows you to edit the data directly from the protection diagram.

It also includes the ability to save or print protection diagrams, and to view the time and current values associated with each curve.

ESRI Import Module

10 March 2006

We have released a new plugin module for importing data from an ESRI GIS system. It uses connectivity data from the underlying 'Geodatabase' to populate a properly connected DESS system. A configuration file is used to match data in the GIS to associated data in DESS, making the plugin capable of importing from a variety of GIS systems regardless of the table and field structure used.