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Design and Implement of Distribution Transformer Outage Detection System

Conference Paper · July 2007

DOI: 10.1109/INDIN.2007.4384777 · Source: IEEE Xplore

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 Design and Implement of Distribution Transformer
Outage Detection System
Hau-Ren Lu and Leether Yao

Abstract—A distribution transformer outage detection density of mobile market in Taiwan in 2005 is 97.4%. It is
system based on radio mobile communication system is still popular although the density declines for recently years.
purposed in this paper. The outage alarm will be sent back to Therefore, Using Short Message Service (SMS) of Global
outage information processing system (OIPS) as long as the System for Mobile (GSM) as a communication interface
outage occurred at transformer. OIPS is designed to be
compliant with Taiwan Power Company (TPC) currently used
have advantages of easy installation and simple
operation management system (OMS) so that TPC’s system construction.
managers are able to precisely and quickly locate outage
affected area and assign engineers for repairs. Transformer TABLE I
Outage Detector (TOD) will also send back a restored signal as WORLD MOBILE MARKET DATA IN 2005
the electricity is restored. The restored message allows TPC’s Total mobile Penetration
system managers to get a grip of electricity restoration Rank Economy cellular (per 100
subs.(000s) Inhabitants)
situation.
1 China 393’428.0 29.9

I. INTRODUCTION 2 United States 201’650.0 67.6

D
3 Russia 120’000.0 83.6
istributed system is usually out of service because of
overloading, Distribution transformer fault, road 4 Japan 94’745.0 74.0
construction or natural calamity. It sometimes causes 5 India 90’000.0 8.16
complaint and discontent from customers. Although TPC ... … … …
has OMS in distribution automatic, the unexpected outage 16 South Africa 33’960.0 71.6
report is still from customers’ phone call. OMS will find the 17 Philippines 32’810.0 39.5
fault location when the enough phone calls are collected. 18 Poland 29’166.4 75.7
Worse efficiency and accuracy of OMS fault location 19 Thailand 27’379.7 43.0
finding occurs due to the lack of data or uncertain outage 20 Taiwan 22’171.7 97.4
event. This paper changes the outage event from customers
to up layer distribution transformers. A transformer detector
actively sends an outage incident via mobile communication [2], [3] discuss the outage management. [3], [4] discover
without passive phone call. The efficiency of repair will be that the fault locations have many uncertain and incomplete
improved and fault locations can be found quickly and message due to the out of service command is from Trouble
accurately. Call Analysis (TCA) or Automatic Meter Reading (AMR).
The above mentioned that fault locations can be quickly Therefore, intelligent data filter algorithm, [5] and [6] can
found if outage events are from Distribution transformers. determine the fault area. In [7], a fuzzy set method for fault
Authors developed a load monitoring and diagnosis system location identification is purposed. [8] improves the fault
for distribution transformer for TPC project. This project location recognition using Prony method that depends on a
monitored and diagnosed 10 distribution transformers via microwave being send when a power fault occurred. Fault
Bluetooth with Personal Digital Assistant (PDA). Thus, a location detection methods with neural network are
transformer detector based on load monitoring and diagnosis described by [9] and [10]. It applies to catch error location in
system is feasible. This detector is called Transformer the end of feeder. Reference [11] discusses that a database
Outage Detector (TOD). analyze and operate to solve the fault of distribution system
Global mobile phone widely has grown up from 1990. from the response of sensors. Geographic Information
Subscribers in the world were only 1.1 millions in that year, System (GIS) applying in Outage Analysis System (OAS) is
however, it has increased to 2.168 billions till 31 Dec. 2005. expressed in [12]. GIS can confirm the event, outage scope,
The population of mobile phone subscriber per a hundred damaged devices position, a route, a map, and customers’
people is from 2.2 to 33.5 during those 16 years [1]. The addresses for maintenance worker to repair the fault problem
detailed information in 2005 is shown in Table I. The quickly and efficiently. Petri-net is a suitable approach to
diagnose fault in distribution system in recent years. [13]
describes that Petri-net is more efficient than traditional
H.-R. Lu and L. Yao and are with Dept. of Electrical Engineering, method and its methodology was tested using the IEEE
National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei, Taiwan. (email:
s4319012@ntut.edu.tw; ltyao@ntut.edu.tw)
118-bus standard test system, furthermore, [4] and [14] used

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Colored Petri-Net (CPN) and [15] executed Fuzzy Petri-Net that the transformer is repaired and the alarm has to be
(FPN) to solve the same problem. Wireless technology removed if it receives restored SMS message from
applies in distribution system for many years and the best distribution transformer.
outcome is capacitor switching control. It improves the
power factor and stabilized the voltage [16-21].
This paper focuses on the design of outage detector for
distribution transformer and the interactive with OIPS.
Section II introduces the architecture. Section III shows the
modules of outage detector. Section IV discusses the
modules of outage information system. Finally, section V
demonstrates the experiments.

II. SYSTEM ARCHITECTURE

System architecture of this system is demonstrated in Fig.
1. Control center consists of OMS with database and OIPS
with database. The send/receive unit is the GSM modem
with Subscriber Identity Module (SIM). OIPS connects to
GSM modem via RS-232 for outage detector connection and
controls by ATtention (AT) command. Lots of outage
messages return to control center in a wide area outage,
therefore control center needs to link many of GSM modem
to solve SMS messages coming at the same time. A Fig. 1. System Architecture
transformer installs an outage detector without respect to
CONNECTIVITY CONNECTIVITY
transformer for lighting, power or both lighting and power.
The main function of detector is detecting the power supply Facility Serial Code FSC: NUMBER(5)
status, that is to say outage detector always catch the AC Unique Facility ID UFID: NUMBER(10)
power. A SMS message will be sent to control center by a Node 1 N1: NUMBER(10)
Node 2 N2: NUMBER(10)
transmission unit via RS-232 in a short of time if AC power Feeder 1 FDR1: NUMBER(5)
is not caught. The transmission unit practically is a GSM Feeder 2 FDR1: NUMBER(5)
modem. Direction DIR: NUMBER(3)
OIPS will receive outage SMS messages and it will Overhead or Underground OHUG: NUMBER(3)
decode this message when an outage event occurs from Switch Status OSTATUS: NUMBER(3)
Phase PHASE: NUMBER(3)
distribution transformers. Outage message will be queried Facility X coordinate X: NUMBER(10,3)
the corresponding Facility Serial Code (FSC) and Unique Facility Y coordinate Y: NUMBER(10,3)
Facility IDentification (UFID) in OMS database. OIPS Logical Table Physical Table
sends the outage information to OMS via LAN and its
Fig. 2. Logical and Physical Table of CONNECTIVITY in OMS
protocol will be discussed in section IV in detail. OMS can
find the feeder no. of transformers from CONNECTIVITY III. OUTAGE DETECTOR OF DISTRIBUTION TRANSFORMER
table field in its database and the table field is displayed in
Fig. 2. It also can find the owner, pole and distribution room, This detector installs in the secondary side of distribution
of this transformer from OWNERUFID filed of Service transformer and continuously detects the voltage. Outage
Transformer (SXFMR) table. Using the UFID of pole, alarm will be sent from detector if outage happens. The
distribution room and high voltage customer outage detector is still operation with battery, even if the
(HICUSTOMER) table are able to locate the high voltage power is cut. The detector also returns restore command
customer list which is affected. Additionally, using the back to control center if the power is restored. The hardware
UFID of pole or distribution room with POLE table or architecture of outage detector is illustrated as Fig. 3 and the
distribution room (DSBNROOM) table can find the location function of each module is listed as follow:
of pole or distribution room. The sequence of procedure as
above finds some information on outage transformer, i.e.
transformer UFID in OMS, affected high voltage customers,
and transformer location. OMS will produce alarms, denote
the outage affected area and fault location when outage
information is arrived. That information gives maintenance
workers precise location for repairs. OIPS has to tell OMS

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Fig. 3. Hardware Architecture of outage detector of distribution
transformer
A. CPU
CPU mainly integrates inputs and outputs data of each
module, for example, recognize power cut from input signal
of AC power detector, encode and decode commands from
GSM module through RS-232 interface, and read control
center’s telephone number, transformers’ serial number
from memory module.
B. GSM Module
AT command can be sent and received SMS by GSM
module. The specification of GSM module is 900MHz,
carrier frequency interval is 200kHz, both interval of send
and receive are 45MHz, and the baud rate is 270kbps by
Gaussian Minimum Shift Keying(GMSK).
C. AC Power Detector
This module is connected to secondary side of transformer
to collect the AC power and decides whether battery supply.
Firstly, AC power in winding of transformer rectifies to a
full-wave 120Hz signal. Secondly, the full-wave signal
transfers into a pulse digital signal via optoisolator; the pulse
digital signal provides CPU to decide whether power is
interrupted. CPU theoretically gets a pulse per 1/120sec
when electricity supplies normally. A doubted outage event
arises if there is no signal coming over 1/120sec. An outage
event would be confirmed if the accumulative time over a
default cycle, recommend 15 cycles.
Outage detection method:
(A) Hardware outage collection
1. Voltage of transformer’s secondary side transfer to
a 5V Sin signal by voltage division through pulse
protection.
2. Sin signal rectifies by full wave rectification, then
crosses the zero cross trigger.
3. A digital signal after zero cross trigger forwards to
CPU to detect.
(B) Software outage detection
1. Software detector continuously monitors the input
trigger signal. Outage is suspected if there is no
trigger signal input over 8.33ms, a period, coming.
2. It turns to outage situation when trigger signals
input are not coming over n periods.
3. It also sets a flag into EEPROM that denotes the
system during outage interval.
(C) Software restored detection
1. Software continuously monitors the input trigger
signal after outage.
2. The restored flag becomes true if electricity is
restored.
D. Memory Module
This module is designed for a non-voltage memory. The
popular non-voltage memory is EEPROM. It saves the
returned messages, for example, control center’s phone
number, transformers’ serial number, outage, and restoration
records.
E. Power Supply
Power source of power supply is from the secondary side
voltage of transformer because the detector installs in
transformer. Power supply outputs DC5V and DC12V to
provide each module.
F. Battery
Battery will provide power to the outage detector after AC
power detector recognizes that transformer is outage.
IV. OUTAGE INFORMATION PROCESSING SYSTEM
Outage Information Processing System (OIPS) is
software that installs at control center. A fault location can
be found when OIPS receives the outage command from
detector. OIPS can find the error location after link up OMS
database. Therefore, two databases have to be connected,
OIPS database and OMS database. Software architecture
and related protocol are presented as following.
A. Software Architecture
The architecture of OIPS is shown in Fig. 4. It consists of
interface integrated module, GSM send/receive module,
outage analyzer module, outage recorder and transformer
heartbeat module, those connect to databases via Open Data
Base Connectivity (ODBC). Each module describes as
following.
(A) Interface Integrated Module
This module is a starting interface; it integrates three
modules as following. The software provides operator to
monitor outage by graphic user interface.
(B) GSM Send/Receive Module
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 Buffer in this module will receive a sequence data if front and back of SMS content, respectively, in order to
outage detector sent SMS into the module via GSM network. identify the SMS content from opposite side. Different
OIPS use the protocol to understand this SMS is heartbeat functions have different codes in SMS message as shown in
response, outage or restore message. Table III and IV.

(C) Outage Analyzer Module TABLE II

USUALLY USED AT COMMAND
This module checks whether SMS includes outage
message, outage time and transformer number. It also finds Command Describes
an outage location and notifies this event to OMS if this AT+CMGF Select SMS message format
SMS is correct. AT+CMGS Send SMS message
AT+CMGR Read SMS message
(D) Outage Recorder AT+CMGD Delete SMS message
It records the outage history for each transformer in OIPS AT+CNMI New SMS message indications
database.

(E) Transformer Heartbeat Module TABLE III

Heartbeat mechanism is designed to inspect whether SMS CONTENT FROM CONTROL CENTER
transformers work correctly. This mechanism is like a ping Function
Starting Function
Data
Ending
code code code
command in IP network. Control center sends a SMS to
each transformer in a fixed time. It will receive a SMS Chang control
phone
center phone * 1 #
response from transformer if this transformer operates number 1
number
correctly. Thus, control center can guarantee the system
Chang control
performs well. center phone * 2
phone
#
number
number 2
Chang control
Interface Integrated Module phone
center phone * 3 #
number
number 3

Heartbeat
* 4 N/A #
request
GSM Send/Receive Outage Analyzer
Module Module

TABLE IV
SMS CONTENT FROM OUTAGE DETECTOR
Transformer
Outage Recorder
Heartbeat Module Starting Function Ending
Function Data
code code code

Heartbeat Transformer
* 5 #
ODBC response number

Transformer
Outage * 6 #
number

OMS database OIPS database Transformer

Restore * 7 #
Fig. 4. Software Architecture of OIPS number

B. Protocol
(A) SMS communication
The GSM module in this paper supports GSM 07.05 AT
command. Control center and outage detector send and
receive SMS by AT command via RS-232 interface.
Frequent usage of AT command is shown in Table II.
The communication mode of SMS message in GSM 07.05
consists of three types, block mode, text mode, and Protocol
Data Unit (PDU) mode. The system uses the simplest mode,
or text mode which sends messages by ACSII code.
A protocol that identifies between request and response
has to be established if control center executes heartbeat test
or outage detectors send outage, restore or heartbeat test
response. A starting code and an ending code add in the
Control center will send ‘AT+CMGF=1\r’,
‘AT+CMGS=”09xxyyyzzz”\r’, and ‘*4#\r\n’ command to
GSM via RS-232, if it executes heartbeat request. That
satisfies AT command, Table III and IV. ”09xxyyyzzz” is a
transformer’s phone number from OIPS database. A new
message appears at first SMS location if detector gets
‘AT+CNMI=”SM”,1’. A SMS content, ‘*4#’, can be read
by ‘AT+CMGR=1’. CPU of detector will similarly
responses ‘*5#’ to GSM module via RS-232 to accomplish
the heartbeat test sequence. This well-operated transformer
will be marked in control center.
(B) Protocol between OIPS and OMS

326
 OIPS mainly send two different message types to OMS TABLE VI
via TCP/IP network, outage message and restore message, SMS TESTING WITH O UTAGE TRANSFORMER
Send Time Serial no. Receive Time Receive Status
respectively. The protocol format is displayed in Table V. 1 14:08 Success
Outage and restore function code are “OUTAGE” and 2 14:08 Success
“RESTORE”, respectively. OIPS gets the error transformer 14:07 3 14:08 Success
no. from SMS and adds the error transformer no. into the 4 14:08 Success
5 14:08 Success
package as table V shown. The packet is built in order to
6 14:10 Success
send the transformer outage information to OMS. 7 14:10 Success
14:10 8 14:11 Success
TABLE V 9 14:11 Success
PROTOCOL FORMAT BETWEEN OIPS AND OMS 10 14:11 Success
Function Function Code Device Serial No. Occurred Time
Outage yyyymm
Message
OUTAGE 10 bits serial no.
ddhhnn
10 messages were also successfully sent by detector from
Restore yyyymm transformer and the communication time was also nearly 1
RESTORE 10 bits serial no.
Message ddhhnn min just as Table VII showed. SMS message can be send
from outage or working transformer according to the display
in Table VI and VII. It means that the system can be
V. EXPERIMENT accomplished with SMS of GSM.
TABLE VII
This section proves two experiments for outage detector
SMS TESTING WITH WORKING TRANSFORMER
communication testing. The communication quality is an Send Time Serial no. Receive Time Receive Status
issue because outage detector installs on the inside of 1 16:32 Success
transformer. It also affects the system and the alarm stability. 2 16:33 Success
16:32 3 16:33 Success
Two experiments help account for a working transformer 4 16:33 Success
does not affect the GSM communication. Thus, SMS of 5 16:33 Success
GSM is a good way to implement the outage detection 6 16:36 Success
system by the SMS verified in this section. 7 16:36 Success
16:35 8 16:36 Success
The testing environment of SMS of GSM is illustrated in 9 16:36 Success
Fig. 5. SMS receiver and outage detector locate at control 10 16:36 Success
center and transformer, respectively. SMS message will be
sent to SMS receiver if an outage event occurs. This outage
detector will continuously send 5 SMS messages twice to VI. CONCLUSION
receiver to verify whether transformer affects SMS message This paper purposes an outage detection system of
delivery in this experiment. distribution transformer with wireless communication and
TPC’s OMS to enhance the distribution automation. The
system mends the uncertainty of trouble phone call from
customers and improves the efficient of the outage location
finding. The outage message is updated from passive
customer end to active transformer end. Detectors installed
in transformers can receive better radio signal in popular
mobile phone usage area. But parts of distribution room are
built at basement where usually can not receive a good radio
signal (e.g. basement or remote districts). Thus, a telephone
communication with silent ring transformer detector needs
to be developed in the feature.

Fig. 5. SMS Communication Testing Environment Architecture ACKNOWLEDGMENT

This work was supported by National Science Council of
Outage SMS message is sent from an outage transformer; the Republic of China under Grant NSC
Restore or heartbeat SMS is sent from a working transformer. 94-2213-E-027-055.
The testing results of the above two experiments with outage
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327
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