Device Isolation in IEC61850 Based Substation Protection Systems

Abstract

Over the past decade, the development and improvement of the IEC61850 Standard has brought many new advantages and features which makes it more attractive to the power utilities, vendors and protection engineers. From the perspective of substation protection systems maintenance and device testing, Edition 2 of IEC61850 introduced additional features that address and warrant configured substation automation performance and execution of test procedures that further heighten the supremacy of the standard. This paper outlines how to implement these new features in multi-vendor based substation protection systems when isolation is required during different types of testing such as commissioning, acceptance and routine maintenance testing. An example of device isolation for maintenance test in an energized IEC61850 based substation is proposed in this paper. The authors also address issues that still are ambiguous topics for protection engineers when dealing with IEC61850 based devices testing.