INTRODUCTION TO PHASOR MEASUREMENT

UNIT
SHANTANU .D. DATAR 1MS17EE052
PRATIK .S. KHOT 1MS18EE408
PAVAN .K 1MS17EE037
DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND ELECTRONICS

ABSTRACT network, and increased applications of power

With the increasing growth of distributed electronic makes the power system more
energy resources on the power grid, more complex and make the estimation of power
observability and control systems system phasor and frequency more difficult.
will be needed to accurately monitor For reliable and secure operation of the power
power flow. Historically power has been system, the estimation of power system
delivered in a unidirectional way but frequency and the magnitude of supply voltage
now as the consumer can generate his own are highly desired under such conditions. How
power with the technologies such as PV the to obtain information about power system
the system has changed to bidirectional voltage and frequency more accurately and
System of power distribution. So efficiently. This becomes very important when
In this review paper, we will review there is a common grid and maintaining the
the term papers related to the phasor same frequency in the entire grid becomes
measuring units which continuously very crucial. If this monitoring is not done this
observe the distribution network, the may lead generators to go out of
latest trends and overcoming the synchronization and lead to complete blackout.
data congestion the PMU and To overcome this problem,among all the latest
also avoiding the power outages due to an state of art one of the best solutions is to have
imbalance in the grid power phasor measurement units, which could
and demand And ensuring The perfect provide the critical information for variety of
match of the load and supply and power system operation, protection and control
avoiding frequency imbalance. applications with the recent development of
phasor measurement units (PMUs), that can
provide real time phasor measurements of
INTRODUCTION voltages and currents, frequency, rate of
During previous years there was only change of frequency, phase angles, real and
unilateral flow of power means the generating reactive power flows and other electrical
stations were generating and the consumers parameters. Previously for the protection
were consuming power but now a days due to against frequency, magnitude and phase angle
hybrid generation systems and mobile mismatch microprocessor based symmetrical
generating stations the consumers are also component distance relay (SCDR) were used
generating power and not only using it but also but these relays were resulting in false tripping
feeding it into the grid to earn revenue and of the circuit breaker due to no communication
also due to power industry deregulation, between the entire power system and there
expansion of the transmission and distribution were no corrective measures taken by it.[5]
 COMPONENTS OF A PMU
Synchronization signals could be distributed
over any of the traditional communication
media currently in use in power systems. Most
communication systems, such as leased lines,
microwave, or AM radio broadcasts, place a
limit on the achievable accuracy of
synchronization, which is too coarse to be of
practical use Fiber optic links, where available,
could be used to provide high precision
synchronization signals, if a dedicated fiber is
Fig 1. A basic overview of PMU.
available for this purpose. The technique of
choice at present is the Navstar Global
Phasor representation of waveforms to solve
Positioning System (GPS) satellite
AC circuits was performed by german-
transmissions. This system is designed
Austrian electrical engineer and mathematician
primarily for navigational purposes, but it
Charles Proteus Steinmetz. A sinusoidal signal
furnishes a common-access timing pulse,
of known frequency is fully described by its
which is accurate to within 1 microsecond at
magnitude VM and angular position θ with
any location on earth. The system uses
respect to an arbitrary time reference by AC
transmissions from a group of satellites in
waveform can be given by v(t) = V cos(ωt + θ
nonstationary orbits at about 10,000 miles
).The phasor representation of this sinusoid is
above the earth's surface. For the accurate
given by V =V + jV = (V / 2)e. Where Vr, Vi
acquisition of the timing pulse, only one of the
are real and imaginary rectangular components
satellites needs to be visible to the antenna.
of the complex number Phasor value and
The antenna is small and can be easily
Vm/√2 is the r m s value of the signal V(t) and
mounted on the roof of a substation control
θ is the instantaneous phase angle relative to a
house. The experience with the availability
cosine function at nominal frequency 50 or 60
and dependability of the GPS satellite
Hz[2].
transmissions has been exceptionally good[6].

Fig 2. Phasor representation of a sinusoidal

wave.[2]
Fig 3.Block diagram of a single phase
The sinusoidal signal and its phasor is given in PMU[6].
Fig 2.
 The GPS receiver provides the 1 nodes, very close approximations of the state
pulse-per-second (pps) signal, and a time tag, estimation measurements can be done[5].
which consists of the year, day, hour, minute,
and second. The time could be the local time,
or the UTC (Universal Time Coordinated).
The l-pps signal is usually divided by a 2. ​Control​- The next obvious application of the
phase-locked oscillator into the required modern PMU is to control the power quality
number of pulses per second for the sampling and power system. This is done by acquisition
of the analog signals. In most systems being of the data through static state estimation and
used at present, this is 12 times per cycle of then transferring the data to the system
the fundamental frequency. The analog signals controller. The controller takes the required
are derived from the voltage and current action and hence modern PMU has a vital role
transformer secondaries, with appropriate to play in control of the power system[5][8].
anti-aliasing and surge filtering. The
microprocessor determines the direct sequence
indicator in accordance with the described
recursive algorithm, and the GPS
synchronization message is assigned to the
pointer as an identification marker along with
the sample number at the beginning of the
window. The calculated sequence of pointers,
one for each measurement of a positive
sequence, is collected in a message stream and
sent to a remote location. The message is sent Fig 4. Communication and control scheme of
over a dial-up connection through a modem. A PMU[10]
480 baud channel can support phase stream
transmission every two to five cycles of the 3. ​Instability Prediction​- PMU not just
fundamental frequency, depending on the measures the state of the power system but
number of transmitted forward phases.[6][2]. also has tools that can confidently predict the
future state to a range of about 1 second. PMU
with the help of a data acquisition system can
APPLICATION monitor previous system states and hence with
1. ​State Estimation​- The main purpose of PMU the present states and the derivatives of
and its evolution was mainly for the sake of different orders can be obtained. As the system
state estimation. State estimation means to parameters from different nodes can be
sample the system parameters (frequency, obtained with timestamps, it is very much
relative phase angle and voltage) for a possible to predict the future state of the
stipulated time. system and the future transients by analyzing
Also, it is not necessary that PMU must be the present states and their derivatives from
installed at all the nodes. The nodes at which different locations. This was not possible in
the PMU is installed are called observable the previous technologies as there was no such
nodes and the nodes on which there are no connectivity and communication speed[4].
direct PMU connections are called
non-observable nodes. It is practically seen
that by analyzing the data from the observable
 The calibrations and testing of a PMU are
handled by a mathematical model called Test
Equation. A test equation is given by (2)
wk(y) = 0. (2)
The analysis of test equation fluctuations is the
core of measurement validation and is given
by (2)
|wk(y)|< d (3)
The value of the threshold for the j-th TE d j is
determined as (4)

Fig 5. An illustration of prediction[4]. d​j =

​ γα ×
√ ( ∑ aij σ2i )
i∈ωj
(4)

ERRORS IN PMU where ω j is a set of measurements entering the

The main application of any Wide Area j-th TE, σ2i is the variance of the
Measurement System(WAMS) is State
measurements, γα is inverse distribution
Estimation(SE). State Estimation of an Electric
N(0,1), determined by the given probability of
power system can be defined as the calculation
bad data penetration in
of the system parameters based on
the SE problem α ; aij are coefficients of TE
measurements. So the measurements of a
PMU are complex values of voltage and [9].
current at nodes and are given by U= Ur + Ui.
So we know that ideal measurement also
called True value are the measurements with CHALLENGES IN PMU TECHNOLOGY
zero error and hence obviously are Ideal. And ● IT (Information Service) for
the practical measurements are real-time cybersecurity issues and firewall
measurements with certain errors. issues.
The measurement equation is given by(1) ● Plant engineering to create installation
procedures and draw.
y(t) = y true(t) +ξ (t) +b(t)+ c(t) (1) ● Protection and maintenance of PMU
● If the PMUs are from different
So the y-true(t) is the ideal measurement and manufacturers then there is a chance
y(t) is the practical measurement which is the that the communication between that
summation of ideal measurement along with two PMUs doesn’t happen[1].
random errors ξ (t), gross error b(t) and ● If PMUs are from the different
systematic error c(t) [7]. manufacturer then there is a chance
Systematic errors are the errors which arise that the methods and the algorithms
from the improper calibration. Examples of used for analysis and sampling data
systematic errors are input error, sensor error, can differ and hence can have different
and signal transmission errors. output results[1].
Gross error is due to careless handling and ● The cost of saving data is very high. It
lack of proper judgment. Random errors are is of order 4GB/day.[3].
the errors in the system which cannot be
minimized, these errors seep into the system
due to unknown reasons.
CONCLUSION
From this paper, we have seen that [6]R. B. Sharma, G. M. Dhole, M. B. Tasare,
measurement of phasors with time tags from “Design of single phase Phasor Measurement
different locations of a power system has a Unit prototype”, in 2016 International
great benefit in analyzing the faults and Conference on Computing Communication
protection of the system. We have also Control and automation (ICCUBEA), ​12-13
discussed the major component in a basic Aug. 2016.
PMU. In the application discussed we have
seen how PMU is used for State estimation, [7]Kolosok. E.Korkina, and A.Mahnitko,
for control and protection and instability "Detection of Systematic Errors
prediction. We have also discussed the error in PMU Measurements by the Power System
equation and the test equation used to calibrate State estimation Methods"
the PMUs. And finally, we have listed some of in the 56th Intern. Scientific Conf.. Power and
the present challenges in the PMU technology. Electrical Engineering of
Riga Technical University, 2015, RTUCON,
Latvia.

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