2018-04-05

Digital Substation

An Overview

Presenter

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 2

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Contents

§ What is a digital substation ?

§ Benefits of digital substation

§ The ABB offering for digital sustation

§ Standardization and interoperability

§ Maintenance and testing

§ Digital substation experiences

§ Summary

§ References

What is a Digital Substation ?

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New challenges for utilities and suppliers

Substation automation challenges

– Increasing demand on refurbishment of
substations
– Project execution under increasing cost
and time pressure
– Better utilization of existing assets
– Increased expectations on transmission
system availability
– Safeguard investment over the entire life
cycle
– Sustainability in the qualification of
operators and suppliers

Digital substations respond to today’s utility challenges

Substation evolution

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Evolution of substation automation

From wired to optical communication

Evolution of current and voltage transformer

From conventional CTs and VTs to NCITs*

Evolution of
conventional VTs and
CTs

Sensors for current

and voltage

New applications like combined

current and voltage NCITs for
metering and protection

Standardized integration
of protection, control and
metering with
IEC 61850

*NCITs = non-conventional
instrument transformers

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What is a digital substation

Comparison of conventional and digital

Conventional
substation

Digital
substation

Digital substations reduce cabling, need less space and increase safety.

What is a digital substation

Building blocks

Substation automation Advanced system and Non-conventional

protection and control equipment supervision for instrument transformers
system with IEC 61850 efficient asset management increase safety and
station bus reduce footprint

Communication system

IEC 61850 process bus,

connecting the switchyard to Stand-alone merging units,
the protection and control bridging the gap between
system analog and digital world.
Compliant to IEC 61850

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Digital Substation and IEC 61850

Conventional

Conventional substations

IEC 61850 Station Bus IEC 61850 Station Bus

Replace wiring and legacy protocols between
bays by digital communication

Interface to field
Hardwired point to point connections between
primary and all secondary equipment

Thousands of hardwired point-point

connections

Digital Substation and IEC61850

Conventional
IEC 61850 Station Bus
Replace wiring and legacy
protocols between bays
IEC 61850-8-1
by digital communication

670 series REB500 650 series

Interface to field
Hardwired point to point
connections between
primary and all secondary
equipment

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Digital Substation and IEC 61850

Digital

Digital substations with process bus

– All signals digital on station and process level
– All information available on communication IEC 61850 Station Bus
network analog measurements, switchgear
status, monitoring data
– Control and protection commands on highly
available fiber optics
IEC 61850 Process Bus
– Information is acquired ones and distributed on
the bus
SAMU
SAMU
NCIT
SAMU NCIT
SAMU
NCIT
NCIT

The process bus reduces cabling and NCIT Non-conventional instrument transformers
efficiently distributes information SAMU Stand-alone merging units

Digital Substation and IEC61850

Digital

IEC 61850-8-1

670 series REB500 650 series

IEC 61850-8-1
IEC 61850-9-2

Digital substation
1) All signals digital, station and process
NCIT
NCIT 2) Analog, status and commands
SAM600
SAM600 3) Acquire once, distribute on a bus

NCIT Non-conventional instrument transformers

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Digital Substation and IEC 61850

IEC 61850 communication services

Client-Server
– Reliable point to point sessions for central Station Gateway
monitoring and control Computer

– Commands, reporting, logs, file transfer,… Client-

Server
Station bus
GOOSE
– Real-time data broadcast for station wide GOOSE

applications e.g. interlocking Prot & Ctrl

– Binary data, indications, commands Devices
SV,
GOOSE Process
Sampled Values (SV) bus

– Real-time data broadcast for collecting

SAM600 SAM600

Merging
measurements from process Unit
Bay 1 Bay
– Sampled analog values n

Benefits of Digital Susbstation

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Benefits of digital substations

Overview

Main benefits
– Safety
– Reduced substation footprint
– Interoperability
– Reduces copper cabling
– Ease of configuration
– Maximum reliability and availability
– Real-time performance
– Smart Grid communications capabilities
– Reduces cost of ownership

Digital substations are safer to operate, future

proof and require less space

Benefits and Challenges

Benefits Challenges

§ Improved safety § Process bus network

§ Reduced space requirements § Bandwidth requirements

§ Reduced cabling § Redundancy requirements

§ Less time spent on engineering, § Cyber security

installation, refurbishment and on- § Highly accurate time
site testing synchronization
§ Increased number of outdoor IEDs
§ Competence building

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Benefits of digital substations

Less copper

Reduction in copper cables by up to 80%* Conventional substation Digital substation

– By replacing the long stretches of copper by

fiber optic cables
– By replacing horizontal wiring between
protection and control IEDs with IEC 61850
– By reducing number of connections between
primary apparatus and redundant process
Up to
interfaces modules
– Copper cables remain for power supply and
80%
copper cable
short connections between primary apparatus reduction
and marshalling kiosks in the switchyard

Point to point copper connections get replaced

with fiber optics

Benefits of digital substations

Less transport

Less material means less transport and

CO2 emissions Conventional substation Digital substation

– More than 30 tons less material to be

transported to site for an average sized
transmission level substation
– The weight of the fiber optic cabling is
around 90% less than the copper cables it
replaces Around
– If CTs are replaced by optical ones, 30t
almost 80% weight reduction on CTs is Less material
achieved

Less transport, less CO2, less heavy lifting

equipment required

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Benefits of digital substations

Space requirement reduced by half Conventional substation Digital substation

Up to 60% and more reduced space for protection

and control panels
– The IEDs require less space due to absence of
conventional IOs
– Absence of terminals enable integration of more
IEDs per panel
Up to
– Integration of protection in GIS LCC enables
further space reduction
60% less
space in relay
Reduction of switchyard footprint by up to 50% room

— By using circuit breakers with integrated Up to

disconnecting functionality and optical current
transformers 50%
reduction
space in the
High function integration in relay room and switchyard
switchyard enable space reduction

Benefits of digital substations

Less installation and outage time

Shorter time for secondary system installation

and refurbishment Conventional substation Digital substation

40% reduction of installation time for new

protection and control systems.
– Fewer panels to install
– Fewer cables to be pulled, connected, tested
Reduction of feeder outage time by 40 to 50%
during secondary system upgrades
40%
– Full system test from process IO to protection, shorter
control and scada system off-site installation
time of P&C
– Installation of new FO based system while system
station is in service 40%
– Flexible placement of new protection panels, outage time
reduction
without depending on SS cabling during P&C
retrofit
Shorter outage times increase system
availability and utility revenues

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Benefits of digital substations

Operational cost reduction

Savings in maintenance and future retrofits Conventional substation Digital substation

Efficient maintenance
– Supervision of all exchanged data, reduces the
need for periodic maintenance testing
– Permanent supervision enables fast and precise
actions in case of failures
Fast and save testing
– IEC 61850 testing and simulation features
enable fast and save isolation and testing of Operational
cost reduction
protection functions
Standard compliance enables efficient future
retrofits of secondary system

Lower operational costs thanks to supervision

and standards

Benefits of digital substations

Increased safety

Reduced risk of electrical shock

– Handling of current transformer circuits
and signaling voltage poses a threat to life
and equipment
– Process bus eliminates the galvanic
connection between protection and control
panels and the switchyard.
– Eliminates CT and VT circuits in the
protection & control panels
– Replaces conventional 110/220VDC
indications with fiber optics

Eliminates the electrical connection between

primary and secondary

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The ABB offering for

Digital Substation

Digital portfolio

SDM600 Asset Network PSGuard Communication Networks

Security & Data management Control Center
Network management
WAMS
Management
& Control

MicroSCADA FOX615
SDM600 AFR677 Multiplexer
SYS600C
Security & data Router
AFF66x Computer HMI IEC104, DNP3.0
management Workstation
Firewall
VPN SYS600C
Gateway
Station
Level
RTU560 NSD570
Teleprotection
IEC 61850
AFS67x
Ethernet Switch
IEC 61850 / Station bus
To remote substation
AFS66x
Ethernet Switch System Engineering
Relion 670/650
Software Tools
Bay control
IET600 PCM600 ITT600
Bay Level Relion 670/650
Protection
RTU540
REB5xx
Busbar protection System Device System
configuration configuration Testing

SAM 600 FOCS SAM 600 CP-MU

Process bus Merging unit Process bus Merging unit
Process I/O system
FO CS
I/O system for NCITs
Level IEC 61850 / Process bus

April 5, 2018 Slide

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The ABB offering for digital substations

Relion® family protection and control IEDs

— 670 series protection and control IEDs and IEC 61850 station bus
PWC600 Switchsync with IEC 61850-9-
2LE process bus for any application

IEC 61850-9-2 process bus

— REB500 distributed busbar protection

system supports IEC 61850-9-2LE

Product portfolio
§ 670 series protection and Control IEDs

§ 670 series high-end protection and control

IEDs with IEC 61850-9-2LE:
§ Bay control IED REC670
§ Line distance protection REL670
§ Line differential RED670
§ Transformer protection RET670
§ Generator protection REG670

IEC 61850-9-2LE § All IEDs can have a 1PPS input for

synchronized sampling
§ All devices support mixed mode with
conventional CT and VT interfaces
eg, transformer low-voltage side for
transformer differential protection
§ Line differential protection runs with
© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 28 conventional and 9-2 remote-end substations

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Product portfolio

§ REB500 decentralized busbar protection

REB500 busbar and
system is fully compliant with
breaker failure IEC 61850-9-2LE
protection

§ Busbar protection
§ Breaker failure protection
§ End-fault protection

§ Seamless combination of bay units with

IEC 61850-9-2LE and conventional bay units
in one system
§ This allows flexible extension of
IEC 61850-9-2LE conventional substations

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 29

Product portfolio
§ Fully redundant and independent system design

System 1 System 2
Protection Metering Metering Protection and control

IEC 61850-9-2LE IEC 61850-9-2LE

PPL PPL

System 1 System 2
© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 30

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Standardization and
interoperabilty

Introduction to process bus

Station level
IEC 61850 on station
§ The station bus connects IEDs and
and process level substation automation system
§ It transmits information between the
IEC 61850 station level and the bay level as
station bus
well as between IEDs (GOOSE)

Bay level
§ The process bus connects the process
to the bay level
§ Binary data as GOOSE messages
IEC 61850-9-2
between merging units and IEDs
process bus
§ Sampled analog values are
transferred via Ethernet according
IEC 61850-9-2
MU MU
Process level
MU § Implemented according to UCAIug
NCIT
implementation guideline
“IEC 61850-9-2LE”
MU = merging unit
© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 32 NCIT = non-conventional instrument transformer

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Maintenance and Testing

Maintainability

§ Workforce challenges § IEC 61850 at working level

§ Cross skilling of workforce
§ New design considerations
§ Change to the test equipment
and testing methods
§ Fault finding techniques

§ System design, functions and

tools need to support efficient
maintenance

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 34

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Commissioing and maintenance

Impact on protection and control testing

“Wiring” test
§ Done automatically through self-supervision
Protection Control features of NCITs, MUs and IEDs

Protection and control testing

IEC 61850-9-2LE
§ “Non-conventional” secondary injection
§ Simulation of IEC 61850-9-2 LE traffic
instead of secondary injection
9-2 § Test modes to simulate U/I, by
SAMU MU
simulator § NCIT
Secondary § Merging unit
injection § Primary injection
NCIT § Primary injection for stability and
directional tests

Primary
injection

Testing tool for IEC 61850

SCL
Configure testing
environment
System § ITT600 SA Explorer - Overview
Configuration
Tool
.SCD
ITT600 SA Explorer

Configure
SA System

Station
Computer

Station bus

IED IED IED IED

Process bus
IED Configuration
Tools
Process Interface Process Interface

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 36

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Digital Substation Experiences

Digital Substations

Bridging the gap between analog and digital technologies

+10,000 +15
IEC 61850 IEC 61860-9-2 Digital
Substation Automation Substation projects in
Systems installed 2015
worldwide

Worlds 1st Process Bus

IEC 61850 Edition 2
developments
Conformance tested Stand alone merging unit
system and device (SAM600) process bus IO
engineering tools systems enabling efficient
upgrades and retrofitting

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ABB’s experience with IEC 61850-9-2 process bus

Project highlights

Pilot installation Pilot installation Pilot installation Real installation Pilot installation Pilot installation Real installation
Braemar, AU SvK, SE Nehden, DE Millmerran, AU Vattenfall, SE TW UK
GIS NCIT, DCB with FOCS, 3rd party NCIT, GIS NCIT, AIS 3rd party NCIT, SAM600 SAM600, FOCS
670series 670series REB500 670series, REB500 670, 630, 615series 670series, 3rd party 670series, 3rd party

2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

Pilot installation Real installation Pilot installation Real installation Pilot installation Pilot installation Pilot installation
Laufenburg, CH Loganlea, AU CH Braemar, AU* UK CN (several) US
GIS NCIT, GIS NCIT, GIS NCIT, GIS NCIT, GIS NCIT, DCB with FOCS DTB with FOCS,
670series, REB500 670series, REB500 670series, 3rd party 670series, REB500 670 series 3rd party SAM600, 670 series

Pilot projects are installations to verify

technology and compare to traditional systems
Real projects are installations without traditional
backup

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Summary

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Summary

§ Non-conventional
instrument transformers,
among other advantages,
increase availability and
safety of substations

§ IEC 61850 process bus

reduces field cabling
simplifies engineering and
enables slim and smart
substation retrofit

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 43

Summary

§ Thought through integration

of process bus in the
substation automation
system suports users in
maintenance activities

§ IEC 61850 testing tools

allow for effizient testing,
commissioning and
maintenance of prozess
bus substations

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 44

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Summary

§ ABBs NCITs, merging units

and IEDs with IEC 61850
process bus are in
commercial operation since
several years

§ Designing products and

systems fully compliant to
IEC 61850 (and future
IEC 61869) is the key to
future proof and
interoperable systems

© ABB Group
April 5, 2018 | Slide 45

References ?
Further Study?

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References

q Specialization Project
Digital Substations in Transmission Networks
Ingvill Urdal Rian , Trondheim, December 2017
Department of Electric Power Engineering, NTNU
Supervisor: Prof. Hans Kristian Høidalen
q Interesting paper presented at DPSP 2018, Belfast, 12-16 March, 2018

”First Digital Substation in TransGrid- Austalia: A Journey, Business case ,

Lessons ”
Authors : Kevin Hinkley and Chirag Mistry

q KPN Future Project proposal (May 2019-May 2023)

” Protection and control in Digital substations- ProDig ”
The project will address digital sub-station environment and utilization of
protection and control equipment. The target is trasmission and regional grids.
Project Supervisor: Prof. Hans Kristian Høidalen
q And More ?

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