Interoperability Testing of IEC 61850 Compatible Intelligent Electronic Devices and Merging Units for Automation in Transmission Substations
Utilities around the world are replacing traditional substation control and protection systems that have reached the end of their asset design life,with new solutions based on the IEC61850 standards.IEC61850 provides an optimal solution by defining Ethernet based network plant and equipment application models with communication services between them that replaces traditional hardwiring and cabling.The standards have been around for several years and are reaching a sufficient degree of reliability and stability for utilities to adopt. New products from major manufacturers with verified compliance to these standards are also becoming available. Before these products are fully applied in a substation, their performance must be evaluated to provide confidence to a utility the system solution will operate as expected and required. The standards define two key elements - GOOSE messages and Sampled Values messages. GOOSE is used for breaker positions, trip commands, pickup signal and alarms while Sample Values are for voltage/current data. Both are transmitted via fibre optic. The adoption of Ethernet topology eliminates the need for copper cable connections and financially saves on the labour and hardware costs of wiring the substation. It also makes interoperability, which is one of the key targets of the standard, possible and facilitates the cooperation between products from different suppliers and allows easy expansion of existing systems. The panels from different vendors and the test bed are described in the paper. The protection and control cubicles from different vendors were connected to Process Bus made up of Ethernet switches. They were configured to protect a transmission substation and feeder, simulated in a Real Time Digital Simulator with faults applied at different locations along the feeder. The performance of the overall protection scheme is influenced by the speed of the communication link and the background traffic. Improper configuration would cause unexpected Sampled Value loss and delay the trip message. The Sample Values and GOOSE messages were transmitted over the network, impaired by the traffic generated by the traffic generator. This evaluates the impact the background traffic poses on the GOOSE and Sample Value messages and helps a utility understand the impact of high volume sample value network traffic and how this traffic is handled by switching devices in a multi-function shared process bus. The simulator subscribes to and monitors the GOOSE trip messages received from the tested IED, and the reception time of these trip messages is used to evaluate the performance of the IEDs when operating over the Process Bus with Merging Units.Test results show that for different combinations of MUs and IEDs, the trip times for 3φ-faults created within Zone 1 are similar and are all within the Zone 1 protection requirement. The results for Zone 2 faults were also as expected. However, when the Sampled Value loss, and the associated communication delays occurred, different combination of Mus and IEDs were affected in different ways. Comprehensive interoperability testing and validation is crucial for the full adoption of the IEC61850 standards.
IEC61850 Substation Control System Intelligent Electronic Devices Interoperability Communication Networks Power System Reliability Substation Automation Substation Protection Test Equipment
Xi Chen Peter Crossley
The University of Manchester United Kingdom
国际会议
国际大电网会议组织保护与自动化专业委员会年度会议暨学术研讨会
南京
英文
1-6
2015-09-20（万方平台首次上网日期，不代表论文的发表时间）