2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution
Power System Harmonic State Estimation based on PMU and Ridge
Estimation
NIU Shengsuo1, LIANG Zhirui1, SU Haifeng1, GAO Jun2
（1. North China Electric Power University, Baoding 071003, China;
2. Hebei Electric Power Institute，Shijiazhuang 050021，China）
Abstract: With the development of measurement in node
voltage, branch current and nodal injection current phasor
measurement system (PMU), the phase measurement system
provides a new idea for power system’s online analysis. For the
harmonic state estimation, we mainly use the PMU
synchronized sampling which installed in different points of
factory, that is, data acquisition device installed in different
plants, the sampling time is synchronized to the same time
base, which are the data harmonic state estimation required.
Set up a simulation system layout the measurement points in a
reasonable way, considering the points which measurement
voltage and current values as a known quantity, establish a
mathematical model. Applying the generalized ridge estimate
to solve the mathematical model in order to obtain the
harmonic voltage of each node in the system, and then
determine the system’s harmonic state.
Keywords: phase measurement system; harmonic state
estimation; generalized ridge estimate
1. Introduction
As technology advanced, the type, quantity and proportion
of non-linear load (such as electric arc furnace, adjustable speed
motor, etc.) in the power system has continued to increase, causing
the harmonic pollution in the power system seriously, the
harmonic seriously affected the power grid’s power quality. The
green energy which promoted now is to build a harmonious
network. This requires effective control of the harmonic in the
power grid and give a penalty to the harmonic injection enterprise.
Only by control the real-time state of the harmonic in the grid can
1
cost-effectively solve the governance and punishment.
In power system if the harmonic source is unknown, but
some node the harmonic data in the power system can be
measured[1], drawing forth the concept of harmonic state
estimation, which is a process generally used the node harmonic
voltage as a state variables, branch current or node voltage and
nodal injection current as a quantity measurement, according to
some estimate’s criterion, by processing the measurement values
to obtain the optimal state value. With the development of power
systems, and the Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU) which based on
the Global Positioning System (GPS) emergence and installed in
the power system, the dispatch center can get a real-time
measurement data–the phase measurement. PMU’s measurement
mainly include node voltage amplitude, phase angle and branch
current amplitude, and some systems include electrical node power
angle measurement[2,3]. Phasor measurement technology provided
harmonic state estimation a precondition, at the same time,
brought the changes of measurements, estimation model,
algorithm and analysis and other related issues. The conventional
state estimation algorithms, including minimum variance
estimation, maximum likelihood estimation, maximum posterior
estimation and least square estimation algorithm, among which
least square estimation often used [4].
2. Mathematical model of harmonic state estimation
The mathematical model of harmonic state estimation:
harmonic state estimation model are voltage measurement, current
measurement or the transform form of the combination. In a
certain premise of the measured configuration, measured values
 2 2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution

Z were associated with the state variables by the following 3. Algorithm for the Mathematical model
equation[5].

Z (h)  H (h) X (h)   (h) （1） 3.1 Least square estimation

Z (h) is the vector of measure matrix, H (h) is the coefficient Measurement matrix equation:

Z  HX   （5）
matrix，  (h) is the measurement noise vector ， h is the

harmonic frequency.
In the above formula H is a measurement matrix of

Measurement matrix express the relationship between （ m  n ）;  is a estimation error matrix of （ m1 ）.
measurement vector and the estimated state vector, if the estimate
Accordance with the least square criterion set up the
value is the node harmonic voltage, there are three kinds of
objective function:
situations.

(1)When the measurement value is nodal injection current IN , J ( X )  ( Z  HX )T ( Z  HX ) （6）

Differentiate the objective function and make it equal to zero:

the relationship between node voltage UN and node admittance
J ( X )
0 （7）
matrix YNN is: X

I N (h)  YNN (h)U N (h) （2） Then can obtain the estimate value: X̂ .

When the coefficient matrix is non-morbid, least square

(2)When the measurement value is node voltage:
estimation can be given an efficient solution, but when the
U N (h)  IU N (h) （3） coefficient matrix is morbid, resulting in an unstable matrix
inversion. Although the obtained solution has the unbiased
I is the unit matrix.
estimate of the minimum variance characteristics, this time the
(3)When the measurement value is the bus’s branch current IL , variance is already very large, that solution may become
inaccuracy, least square estimation is no longer a good estimate.
the relationship between node voltage UN and admittance To solve this problem proposed the generalized ridge estimate to
replace least square estimation.
matrix YLN is:
3.2 Generalized ridge estimate and the method for
I L (h)  YLN (h)U N (h) （4） determining the ridge parameter

Solving equation (1), n is the number of state variables.

in the above formula YLN  YL AT ; YL is branch admittance

matrix; A is correlation matrix. N  HT H is full rank, ordinarily using least square estimation

X  N 1H T Z to obtain the estimate value of X , the

solution is only one. And the estimate value is the best linear
unbiased estimator. But when the equation is full rank and the
absolute value of the determinant may be very small, this equation
 2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution 3

is called morbid equation. When H or Z matrix have a small

kr 1  kr  2    kn  t  k0 (t  1, 2 ) circularly
change may lead to the least square estimation’s solution serious
distortion. 1970 Hall(A.E.Hoerl) and Gasconade(R.W.Kennard)
calculated the estimated value X , if for all i  1, 2, n ,
have proposed ridge estimate which has smaller mean square error
than least square estimation. Ridge estimate is defined as[6]:
xi(t )  xi(t 1)  0.01 , xi(t ) ri  0 , ri is H and Z ’s
T 1
X  ( N  GKG ) H Z T
（8）
correlation matrix[7].
In the above formula G is a orthogonal matrix, can make The reason that the generalized ridge estimate can improve
least square estimation is because it added a suitable constant on
GT NG    diag (1 , 2 , , i ) （9）
the diagonal element of the matrix, thus improve the singularity of
the original normal matrix. When model is morbid it may improve
Among the formula i  0(i  1, 2, n) is eigenvalues for
the precision of the harmonic state estimation effectively.

N , and have been sorted in the order from small to

4. Realization of the system simulation and algorithm
research
large 1  2    n . K  diag (k1 , k2 , , kn ) is
In this paper, the simulation system uses 5 nodes in the
called ridge parameter of the generalized ridge estimate.
three-phase electrical power system, its topological graph like
When the condition number of N is
graph 1. MATLAB7.0 simulation software is be used to carry on
k  1 / n  100 , there has a medium or above the level of the simulation. The harmonic source is in node 5, and the
simulation of the harmonic source uses the simulation of nonlinear
multicollinearity. Defined i as a special eigenvalue. load; The PMU disposed in 2, 4 bus, and each node’s measurement
equations can be written according to the mathematical model.
Obviously, when there is a special eigenvalue, least square
Bus
estimation’s performance may be bad.
Line
Bus 1 Bus 2 Bus 3
The generalized ridge estimate: Branch current
Branch 1 Branch 2

X  G  GH Z
T T
（10） Voltage Measurement
injection current
Br

among the formula

a
nc
h
3

Branch 4
  diag (1 (1  k1 ),1 (2  k2 ), ,1 (n  kn )) , the condition

Bus 4 Bus 5
number is 1 / n  a 10b , b[1,10] , b is natural
Figure 1. 5-node system configuration measurement diagram
number, select the initial value k0  0.05 102b this can Choose node voltage as the state variables. The PMU is
disposed in bus 2 and 4, and considering the branch current which
link the value k0 and conditions value 1 / n . For connected with these two nodes and bus voltage as well as the
injection current as the known quantity. Because the injection
k1  k2    kr  0 , the first r eigenvalues are normal, current is the completely redundancy measurement, so the
injection current equation is not considered. By the principle of
the following is the ridge parameter which corresponding to the
node optimizing code[8], the measurement equation can be written
special eigenvalues:
as:
 4 2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution

 Z 2,1  1/ z1,2 1/ z1,2 0 0 0  Table 1. Least square estimation error (%) when ill coefficient

Z   0 1 0 0 0  U1 
matrix
 2  Bus No.

0  U 2 
Harmonic 1 2 3 4 5
 Z 4,2   0 1/ z2,4 0 1/ z2,4 frequency
     5 0.0165 0.0003 0.0092 -0.0003 -0.0020

 Z 2,3    0 1/ z2,3 1/ z2,3 0 0  U 3  7 0.0299 0.0007 0.0190 -0.0008 -0.0068

 Z4   0   11 0.0674 0.0019 0.0465 -0.0019 -0.0311

0 0 1 0  U 4  13 0.0917 0.0026 0.0642 -0.0026 -0.0525
    17 0.1500 0 0.1100 0 -0.1200

 Z 2,4   0 1/ z2,4 0 1/ z2,4 0  U 5  19

23
0.1900
0.2700
0
0.0100
0.1300
0.2000
0
0
-0.1600
-0.2600
Z   0 0 0 1/ z4,5 1/ z45  25 0.3200 0.0100 0.2300 -0.0100 -0.3300
 4,5   Table 2. Ridge estimation error (%) when ill coefficient matrix
Bus No.
Among the formula, Zi, j express that the current direction Harmonic 1 2 3 4 5
frequency
5 0.0015 0.0003 -0.0058 -0.0003 -0.0020
between node i and node j is from i to j . Zi is the 7 0.0149 0.0007 0.0040 -0.0008 -0.0068
11 0.0524 0.0019 0.0315 -0.0019 -0.0311
13 0.0767 0.0026 0.0492 -0.0026 -0.0525
voltage measurement value of node i . zi. j is the impedance 17 0 0 -0.0400 0 -0.1200
19 0.0400 0 -0.0200 0 -0.1600
23 0.1200 0.0100 0.0400 0 -0.2600
value of the line between node i and node j. 25 0.1700 0.0100 0.0800 -0.0100 -0.3300
Table 3. Phase angle (degrees) error when ill coefficient matrix
The graph of harmonic component of harmonic Bus No
source-branch current: Harmonic 1 2 3 4 5
frequency
5 0.0029 0.0056 0.0316 -0.0054 -0.0341
7 0.0035 0.0100 0.0465 -0.0096 -0.0813
11 0.0048 0.0169 0.0720 -0.0158 -0.2367
13 0.0056 0.0190 0.0839 -0.0176 -0.3321
17 0 0 0.1131 0 0.5655
19 0 0 0.1131 0 -0.6786
23 0 0 0.1131 0 -0.9613
25 0 0 0.1696 0 -1.0744
It can be seen from table one and two: the amplitude error of
generalized ridge estimate is smaller than least square estimation's.
Table three is for the phase angle error, and there is no obvious
Figure 2. Harmonic component of harmonic source-branch current difference between least square estimation and generalized ridge
It may be seen from the above graph: The branch in where estimate. The following histogram is the amplitude error of least
harmonic source exist has the harmonic number of 6K  1 . And square estimation and generalized ridge estimate:
6K  1 harmonic is a positive sequence, 6K  1 harmonic is
negative sequence. Using least square estimation and generalized
ridge estimate carry on the state estimation to the first 25
harmonics, when the equation is morbid. Estimation error can be
list as follow:

Figure 3. Least square estimation error when ill coefficient matrix

 2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution
Figure 4. Ridge estimation error when ill coefficient matrix
According to the result from above estimate, the estimate
error which carries on with least square estimation in harmonic
state estimation is smaller in the non-morbid coefficient matrix,
and it can reflect system's harmonic condition accurately, but the
estimation error is heavy when the coefficient matrix is morbid.
The generalized ridge estimate can give a smaller error than least
square estimate when the coefficient matrix is morbid.
5. Conclusion
According to the traditional harmonic state estimation's
insufficiency, a corrective method has been proposed. The
synchronized phasor measurement is able to reduce the
measurement error effectively. The least square estimation can
make an effective estimate when the system state is completely
observable. The generalized ridge estimate can give a smaller
estimate error than the least square estimation when coefficient
matrix is morbid. The simulation results prove the above
conclusion.
References
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Biography
NIU shengsuo（1980-）,male, North China Electric
Power University, graduate of doctor ， lecturer, mainly
engages in electrical equipment parameter measurement
technology and research.
Email:niushengsuo@163.com
LIANG zhirui（1959-）, male, North China Electric
Power University, Professor, City Power Supply special
committee members of Chinese Society of Electrical
Engineering, engages in power system automation, power
system monitoring and fault diagnosis technology in
teaching and research.
Email: zhiruil@yahoo.com.cn
SU haifeng（1977-），male, North China Electric Power
University, graduate of doctor，lecturer, mainly engages in
the research of power quality monitoring and network
 6 2010 China International Conference on Electricity Distribution

planning.
Email: hfsups@yahoo.com.cn