Case Study: Lake Pontchartrain Causeway achieves automated power restoration with SEL relays

SEL Relays Simplify Power System Protection on World’s Longest Overwater Application

The Greater New Orleans Expressway Commission, which operates the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway in New Orleans, needed to modernize the bridge’s aging electrical infrastructure to support drawbridges, toll facilities, cell towers, and warning signs. Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories (SEL) was brought in through the project’s integrated switchgear solution to help provide the protection, control, and communications needed for a more reliable and automated distribution system.

SEL provided SEL-351S Protection and Breaker Control Relays, MIRRORED BITS communications, and ACSELERATOR software as part of an automated restoration scheme built into the bridge’s switchgear packages. The system enabled fault detection, isolation, and power restoration across the 24-mile causeway, with utilities able to backfeed power from either shore and restore service within 30 seconds; factory acceptance testing confirmed the timing and reconfiguration logic before deployment.