The Pathway for PMUs into Dominion Virginia Power’s Control Center

IEEE PES GM 2015 Panel Session on the Pathway for Synchrophasors into Control Centers

July 28, 2015 – Denver, COPresented by: Kevin D. Jones, Ph.D.

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About Dominion Virginia Power2

Electric Transmission 6,400 miles of transmission lines

500kV – 1250 miles 230kV – 2600 miles 115kV – 2300 miles

Electric Distribution 56,900 miles of distribution lines 2.5 million franchise retail

customer accounts in VA and NC

PMU Integration began in 2009 with SGIG and Non-Stimulus grants completed in 2013 80 PMUs in EHV network 21 500kV Substations monitored with PMU 27 control houses involved

Suite of PMU-based network applications Three Phase Linear State Estimator CT & PT Calibration Sequence Component Monitoring Decision Tree Based Islanding Detection

PMUs at DVP Since the DemoContinuing forward…• Developed internal subject

matter expertise• Standardized deployment

strategy• Establishment of PMU and

signal naming conventions• A push for data quality• PDC architecture upgrades• Modeling automation• Identification of organization-

wide value potential

Struggles & pain points• Routine maintenance• Managing planned and

unplanned outages• Commissioning of new PMU

devices• SME time allocation to non-

synchrophasor efforts• Determination of process

ownership• Operations integration and

app support

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PMUs in DVP Control Room4

PMUs in DVP Control Room5

• Synchrophasor are in the control room!

• Simple visualizations build trust in new technology

• Demonstrates end-to-end system

However, this can’t be the pinnacle of success for control

room integration!!

Provisions for Control Room Integration

– More synchrophasors• Organic continued deployment through strategic

standardization– A commitment to data quality

• End-to-end considerations for data quality– Operational data analytics & applications

• Next gen. data arch., analytics for ‘complete package’– Mature data visualizations

• Start simplistic build trust evolve– Engineer and operator training

• Developing internal subject matter expertise

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The Pathway for PMUs into DVP’s Control Center

• Align synchrophasor goals with key functions and values of DVP as Transmission Owner (TO)

• Limitation of scope: synchrophasors can do so many things, but pick a small number of use cases to champion

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System Restoration

Situational Awareness

State Estimation

State Estimation with PMUsWhy is State Estimation key?• Integration of PMU measurements

into traditional state estimators– Cross validation of data and model

• PMU data validates SCADA data and network model

• SCADA data and model validate PMU data

• Linear state estimation for synchrophasor-only network applications

• PMU integration into SE is a known solution (low risk value add) – We can pattern after others– We can expect a workable result

Challenges to SE Integration• At DVP, the supporting

infrastructure is in place– Central PDC– Translation adapter to EMS

• Human/time resource is needed to ramp up– Integrate existing PMUs– SCADA modeling– SE testing

• Need a sustainable process to maintain, troubleshoot, and grow synchrophasor footprint in traditional SE

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Situational Awareness with PMUs

• Polar Chart • Early Warning System

for Blackouts • Community Watch -

everyone should do their part!

• NE Blackout of 2003• Angle Walkout

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Situational Awareness with PMUs

• How to keep operators informed of “What just happened??”

• Event Detection – Success stories of FNET demonstrate the ability of time synchronized measurements to detect and locate events

• Near Real Time Event Analysis – Post event analysis just after an event to provide operators with event narrative

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System Restoration with PMUs• During system restoration activities, especially black start

scenarios, Dominion is not just a TO anymore– During black start conditions, TO is likely to be its own BA, RC, etc.

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Frequency Monitoring– Low system inertia– It will be important to know

the affect operator switching decisions will have on frequency.• So that we don’t try to pick up

too much load• So that we don’t waste time

picking up loads that are very small

System Restoration with PMUs• During system restoration activities, especially black start

scenarios, Dominion is not just a TO anymore– During black start conditions, TO is likely to be its own BA, RC, etc.

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Island Synchronization– LSE can handle computational

and physical islands– Synchronized monitoring of

islands• Voltage• Frequency• Angle across breaker

PMU Locations

Computational isolated regions

Electricallyisolated regions

System Restoration with PMUs• During system restoration activities, especially black start

scenarios, Dominion is not just a TO anymore– During black start conditions, TO is likely to be its own BA, RC, etc.

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V1

V2Vx

Vy

Iy

Breaker Closing Angle– Thin application layer over LSE– If Line1-2 is open, how to tell

breaker closing angle?• Substitute V1 with Vx

• Compute Vx with Vy & Iy

System Restoration with PMUs• During system restoration activities, especially black start

scenarios, Dominion is not just a TO anymore– During black start conditions, TO is likely to be its own BA, RC, etc.– Applications which may not seem relevant for day-to-day operations

can become much more valuable under stressed or outaged system conditions

• Network applications developed for system restoration conditions could have ‘blue sky’ analogues where the application can be adapted to provide value day-to-day

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Summary & Conclusion

• Fundamentals key to control room integration:– Standardized deployment strategies– Data quality solutions– Applications and data analytics– Mature visualizations– Engineer and operator training

• While synchrophasors are capable of much, scope limitation and functional alignment are also imperative to control room integration:– State Estimation– Situational Awareness– System Restoration

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Questions?

• Contact InfoKevin D. Jones, Ph.D.Operations Planning – System Operations CenterDominion Virginia PowerPersonal Mobile: 304-767-4748Office Mobile: 804-380-0658Office: 804-273-3316kevin.d.jones@dom.comkevin.d.jones@outlook.com

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