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Micro-phasor Measurement Units (μPMUs) and Its Applications in Smart

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DOI: 10.1007/978-981-10-8249-8_7

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Micro-phasor Measurement Units
(lPMUs) and Its Applications in Smart
Distribution Systems

Alok Jain and Suman Bhullar

Abstract The installation of phasor measurement units (PMUs) in the power grids
is mainly focused on the transmission systems. Researchers are continuously
working on the PMUs for its installation in the transmission system. But, now due
to the advancement in distribution system, i.e., for smart distribution system, a
device is going to be installed which creates real-time synchrophasor data from the
consumer voltage level, called lPMUs, which could provide new insight into
modern power systems. These units can be created more cheaply, an order of
magnitude less, than current commercial PMUs. For this reason, many more
lPMUs could be deployed and provide a much higher resolution of the distribution
grid. So, in this paper, the concepts like why we need micro-PMUs and its block
diagram are explained. This paper also discusses the applications for synchrophasor
technology in distribution systems.

Keywords Discrete Fourier transform (DFT)
Global positioning system (GPS)

lPMU PDCs WAMS

1 Introduction

A lPMU is a phasor measurement unit that measures time-synchronized voltage

and phase angle at high sample rates *30/s for transmission and 120/s for distri-
bution. The lPMU is a power quality recording instrument with GPS receiver to
enable highly accurate time-stamping for voltage and phase angle measurement.
Conventional PMUs in use for the transmission system have ±1° accuracy,

A. Jain (&)
Department of Electrical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology (BHU),
Varanasi, India
e-mail: [email protected]
S. Bhullar
Department of Electrical & Instrumentation Engineering, Thapar University,
Patiala Punjab, India

© Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2018 81

R. K. Pillai et al. (eds.), ISGW 2017: Compendium of Technical Papers, Lecture
Notes in Electrical Engineering 487, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8249-8_7
82 A. Jain and S. Bhullar

and lPMU has 0.01°. A multiphase power flow model and state estimation for
distribution systems have been formulated, and solution methods have been pre-
sented. It also addresses the following issues like modeling, implementation,
observability, and performance [1]. The problem of state estimation in very large
power systems has been investigated which may contain several control areas [2].
An approach, which leaves the traditional state estimation software in place, dis-
cusses a novel method of incorporating the phasor measurements, and the results of
the traditional state estimator in a post-processing linear estimator have been dis-
cussed [3]. The benefits of using PMUs for selected real-time applications and
present ongoing pilot projects and experience worldwide, and to give short- and
long-term road map for future acts have been discussed [4, 5]. Different mea-
surement techniques have been developed by employing global positioning system
(GPS) receivers that are suited to the continuous monitoring of the electrical
quantities in distribution networks in terms of synchronized phasors [6]. A brief
introduction to the PMU and wide-area measurement system (WAMS) technology
has been presented and also discusses the uses of these measurements for improved
monitoring, protection, and control of power networks [7]. Diverse concepts for the
next generation of power distribution system have been summarized whose
objective is to bring distribution engineering more closely aligned to smart grid
philosophy [8]. Phasor measurement units (PMUs) were installed in an industrial
distribution network, and synchronized measurements taken from the PMU at
medium and low voltage during different system states were analyzed [9]. Different
applications based on energy accounting on the acquisition of the phasor mea-
surements using phasor measurement units (PMU) have been discussed [10]. The
developments and present status of the Indian power grid have been discussed and
also explore the key areas in which a wider deployment of PMUs may be utilized to
make the national grid smart [11]. A new probabilistic approach of the real-time
state estimation on the micro-grid has been presented [12]. The performances of a
phasor measurement unit (PMU) prototype based on a synchrophasor estimation
algorithm conceived for the monitoring of active distribution networks have been
introduced [13]. A new technique for estimation of distribution network load model
parameters based on PMU measurements data and harmony search algorithm
(HSA) have been proposed [14]. The meter placement problem for the measure-
ment infrastructure of an active distribution network, where heterogeneous mea-
surements provided by phasor measurement units (PMUs) and other advanced
measurement systems such as smart metering systems are used in addition to
measurements that are typical of distribution networks has been studied [15]. The
contribution of PMUs that can provide to handling different challenges by exam-
ining recent research results on applications of synchrophasors in distribution
systems has been examined [16]. The state estimator of all buses in a three-phase
network has been presented and proposed greedy algorithm and integer program-
ming optimization method to determine the optimal solution [17]. A mixed-integer
programming formulation of DSE that is capable of simultaneously discarding
predicted values whenever sudden changes in the system state are detected has been
used [18]. Developing and testing frequency-adaptive PMU algorithms with wider
Micro-phasor Measurement Units (lPMUs) and Its Applications … 83

linearity range than specified in IEEE Std C37.118-1 have been evaluated in [19],
by means of three different concepts, i.e., FIR bandpass filtering, extended Kalman
filtering (EKF), and discrete Fourier transform (DFT). The impact of the uncer-
tainties (in terms of phase and magnitude) introduced by arbitrary PMUs on a state
estimation process performed on the IEEE 13-bus distribution test feeder has been
analyzed [20, 21].

2 Why There Is Need of lPMUS?

Higher degree of accuracy is required for distribution as the angle differences and
changes are significantly smaller than in transmission because of the different X/R
ratios. lPMU plays an important role in distribution planning and operations as
measurement of phase angle and difference in angle between points provides the
ability to calculate impedance which is not possible without the PMU. Phase angle
also gives information on the direction of power flow for analysis of topology
changes or errors. Line level measurement represents an improvement over smart
metering for estimating loads on a per phase basis. Today, PMUs are almost
exclusively used in high-voltage power transmission. Distribution system applica-
tions are more challenging, in three important respects:
1. The voltage angle differences between two locations on a distribution circuit
will tend to be at least an order of magnitude smaller than those on the trans-
mission network, because the power flows are much smaller, and the reactance
between points of interest is also much smaller. Consequently, meaningful
measurement of phase angle differences on distribution systems requires much
higher precision—meaning more precise time-stamping and shorter latencies in
every step of the transfer of the measurement. Accuracies of the PMUs can still
vary by ±1°, while the proposed lPMU technology is expected to discern angle
differences to an accuracy of better than ±0.05°.
2. Distribution system measurements will be fraught with much more noise from
which the signal must be extracted. This is simply due to the proximity of a
large number of different devices connected per mile of circuit at the distribution
level, including loads as well as utility switchgear, transformers, capacitors, that
may introduce harmonic distortion and transients. Consequently, the back-
ground “noise” must be analyzed carefully along with the angle measurements
and with the same time stamp. This functionality is not yet standard in PMUs for
transmission, where power disturbances are sufficiently infrequent that it is not
necessary to explicitly link PMU data to a range of concurrent electrical events.
To interpret the rare major disturbance, angle data must then be cross-referenced
with data from other monitoring devices after the fact.
3. The economic value of transmission power flows means that larger investments
can be justified, with less pressure on the acceptable costs of instrumentation as
well as data transmission and concentration. By comparison, the installed costs
84 A. Jain and S. Bhullar

must be far lower to make a reasonable business case for the installation of
multiple PMUs on a distribution circuit, simply based on the amount of con-
nected load whose service quality or reliability would stand to benefit from
increased visibility and better understanding of the dynamics on the circuit.
4. The PMU device can be connected to single- or three-phase secondary distri-
bution circuits up to 690 V (line-to-line) or 400 V (line-to-neutral), either into
standard outlets or through potential transformers (PTs) as are already found at
distribution substations or could be added on primary distribution circuits if
necessary.

3 Micro-phasor Measurement Unit

Micro-phasor measurement unit (lPMU) technology provides phasor information

(both magnitude and phase angle) in real time, and the data provided by PMUs are
very accurate and enable system analysts to determine the exact sequence of events
which have led to the blackouts and malfunctions that may have contributed to the
catastrophic failure of the power system. One of the most important features of the
PMU technology is that the measurements are time-stamped at the source due to
which data transmission speed is no longer a critical parameter in making use of this
data. All PMU measurements with the same time stamp are used to infer the state of
the power system at the instant defined by the time stamp. It is clear that lPMU data
could arrive at a central location at different times depending upon the propagation
delays of the communication channel in use. The time tags associated with the
phasor data provide an indexing tool which helps create a coherent picture of the
power system out of such data.
A. Phasor and its representation:
Consider a pure sinusoidal quantity given by
p
xð t Þ ¼ 2 X Sin ðxt þ uÞ ð1Þ

x being the frequency of the signal in radian per second, and u being the phase
angle in radians.
Equation (1) can also be written as

xðtÞ ¼ RefX ejðxt þ uÞ g ¼ Re½fejðxtÞ gX eju  ð2Þ

The sinusoid of Eq. (1) is represented by a complex number X* known as its

phasor representation
Micro-phasor Measurement Units (lPMUs) and Its Applications … 85

Fig. 1 a A sinusoid. b Its phasor representation

X  ¼ Xeju ¼ X½Cos u þ j Sin u ð3Þ

A sinusoid and its phasor representation are shown in Fig. 1a, b. The phase angle
of the phasor is arbitrary, as it depends upon the choice of the axis t = 0. Note that
the length of the phasor is equal to the RMS value of the sinusoid.
B. Block Diagram of Micro-phasor Measurement Unit:
Phasor measurement unit (PMU) technology provides phasor information (both
magnitude and phase angle) in real time, and its block diagram is shown in Fig. 2.
The analog inputs are currents and voltages obtained from the secondary windings
of the current and voltage transformers. The current and voltage signals are con-
verted to voltages with appropriate shunts or instrument transformers so that they
are matched with the requirements of the analog-to-digital converters. The sampling

Fig. 2 Block diagram of the lPMU

86 A. Jain and S. Bhullar

rate chosen for the sampling process dictates the frequency response of the
anti-aliasing filters. In most cases, these are analog-type filters with a cutoff fre-
quency less than half the sampling frequency in order to satisfy the Nyquist cri-
terion. The sampling clock is phase-locked with the GPS clock pulse. Sampling rate
can be used 12 samples per cycle of the nominal power frequency to as high as 96
or 128 samples per cycle. The microprocessor calculates positive-sequence esti-
mates of all the current and voltage signals.
C. Global Positioning System:
The most important use of the GPS system is to generate the signal of one
pulse-per-second. This pulse when received by any receiver on earth is coincident
with all other received pulses within 1 ls. In practice, much better accuracies of
synchronization of the order of a few hundred nanoseconds have been realized. There
are four satellites in each of the six orbital planes displaced from each other by 60° and
having an inclination of about 55° with respect to the equatorial plane, which orbit
around the earth with a period of half a day as shown in Fig. 3. The GPS satellites keep
accurate clocks which provide the one pulse-per-second signal.
D. Hierarchy for PMUs:
The PMUs are situated in power system substations and provide measurements
of time-stamped positive-sequence voltages and currents as well as frequency and
rate of change of frequency of all monitored buses and feeders. The measurements
are stored in local data storage devices, which can be accessed from remote loca-
tions for diagnostic purposes. The phasor data are also available for real-time
applications. At the next level, phasor data concentrators (PDCs) are present as
shown in Fig. 4, which gather and record the data, reject altered data, and align the
time stamps from several PMUs. PDCs have storage facilities and application
functions which need the PMU data available at the PDC. This can be made
available by the PDCs to the local applications in real time. An another level of the

Fig. 3 GPS satellite

Micro-phasor Measurement Units (lPMUs) and Its Applications … 87

Fig. 4 Hierarchy of the PMUs and PDCs

hierarchy is called super data concentrator (SDC) where there is facility for data
storage of data aligned with time tags as well as a steady stream of near real-time
data for applications which require data over the entire system. Figure 4 shows the
communication links to be bidirectional. As, most of the data flow is upward in the
hierarchy, although there are some tasks which require communication capability in
the reverse direction.
E. Communication links for PMUs:
Communication facilities are essential for applications requiring phasor data at
remote locations. Generally, two types of data transfer are used in any communication
task. Channel capacity is the measure of the data rate that can be sustained on the
available data link. The second aspect is the latency, defined as the time lag between the
time at which the data is created and when it is available for the desired application.
Diagnostic analysis applications require PMU data to help in analyzing the power
system performance during major disturbances. Leased telephone circuits were among
the first communication media used for these purposes. Switched telephone circuits can
be used when data transfer latency is not of importance. Electric utility communication
media like power line carrier and microwave links have also been used. But, now the
fiber-optic links is used as the medium which have high data transfer rates, unsurpassed
channel capacity, and immunity to electromagnetic interference.

4 Distribution Applications

Diagnostic applications and control applications are broadly classified applications

of micro-PMUs, and it is useful to distinguish diagnostic from control applications
using lPMU data to help operators better understand the present or past condition
of the distribution system, or to inform specific control actions to be taken (likely by
automated systems) in more or less “real time.”
88 A. Jain and S. Bhullar

A. Diagnostic Applications:
Diagnostic applications for consideration includes island detection, fault location
and high-impedance fault detection, identification of fault-induced delayed voltage
recovery (FIDVR), distribution system state estimation including reverse power
flow detection and phase balancing, renewable generation monitoring, oscillation
detection, characterization of generator inertia, supporting transmission system
diagnostics, and many more.
Some of them are explained below:
(1) Island Detection:
Today’s inverters have very reliable anti-islanding protection. However, with
greater penetration of diverse distributed resources and more complex dynamics on
distribution circuits, it may become increasingly difficult-to-distinguish fault events
from other abnormal conditions where it is desirable to keep DG online (e.g.,
low-voltage ride-through). The comparison of phase angle between a potential
island and the rest of the grid is the most definitive test that offers not only high
sensitivity, but specificity—i.e., ruling out an island if the phase angle remains
locked, and thus allowing generators to remain online when they are needed most.
Preventing DG from unnecessary trips during stressed grid conditions has important
implications not only for distribution power quality and reliability but for trans-
mission operators as well, who are increasingly concerned about the vulnerability of
the grid to cascading events behind the substation.
(2) Fault Detection and Location:
Protective devices on distribution circuits are generally based on overcurrent
relays that respond to a combination of current magnitude and duration. This makes
it very difficult to detect high-impedance faults, where the fault current is similar in
magnitude to load current. Furthermore, once a fault is isolated, its exact location is
difficult to determine remotely.
The actuation of a particular circuit breaker or fuse only identifies a general
section of a feeder where the fault has occurred. The standard approach then is for
line crews to physically patrol the length of the faulted line section, looking
for damaged equipment. This process is time-consuming and costly, even more so
for underground cables.
Algorithms exist for recognizing high-impedance faults as well as for locating
faults through proper analysis of monitored data, but the quality of available mea-
surements on distribution circuits is often insufficient to support them. We expect that
lPMUs will allow fault detection and location with much greater precision than
before, even with relatively few devices deployed on a circuit. This is because voltage
angle measurement makes it possible to compute changes in impedance between two
measured points and thus diagnose a fault even if the current magnitude is insufficient
to trip a protective relay. The impedance between the faulted point and a PMU
on either side then also indicates the relative location of the fault. If successful,
Micro-phasor Measurement Units (lPMUs) and Its Applications … 89

methods based on lPMU measurements could drastically reduce service restoration

times and enhance safety by ensuring reliable fault detection.
(3) Fault-Induced Delayed Voltage Recovery (FIDVR):
It is a condition marked by a prolonged period of voltage recovery after a
low-voltage event due to a relatively brief fault, followed by voltage overshoot and
a period of high voltage. FIDVR is caused primarily by single-phase residential air
conditioners that stall under low voltage and draw large currents before triggering a
thermal switch that trips them off.
The resulting loss of load then causes a high voltage condition, which can in turn
trigger corrective devices such as switched capacitor banks and create further
instability. FIDVR is a problem identified at the transmission level, but will likely
be resolved in distribution where the problem originates. The diagnostic challenge,
for which lPMU data may be suitable, is to quickly distinguish the unique char-
acteristics of FIDVR from other types of abnormal voltage conditions, or even
anticipate a FIDVR event, so as to avoid overcorrection and perhaps develop
effective active mitigation measures.
(4) Postmortem Analysis:
In case of the need for analysis after a fault, the recorded synchrophasor mea-
surements are very valuable. With these “flight recorder data” available, a quick
evaluation of the facts can be performed. Intelligent user interfaces enable the
operator to quickly find the cause and sequences of the disturbance. Also the
documentation of the event, for example, on request of authorities is possible in a
fast and easy way. This application is valuable also for use in distribution networks.
(5) Voltage Stability Monitoring:
Voltage stability monitoring is one of the standard applications for synchrophasor
measurements. In transmission systems, this application monitors the load of a
transmission line or corridor, using PMU measurements on both ends. In distribution
systems, there are normally no explicit transmission corridors. However, monitoring
of the dynamics of the voltages gives a good picture of the reactive power flow.
(6) State Estimation:
State estimation, or identifying the steady-state voltage magnitude and phase angle
at each node in a network, significantly informs the situational awareness of human
operators as well as many automated control actions in a power system. However,
state estimation is generally more difficult for distribution than for transmission
systems. This is because distribution systems are harder to model (owing to
untransposed lines with phase imbalances, small X/R ratios, large numbers of con-
necting load points, and less redundancy from Kirchhoff’s laws) and present a
high-dimensional mathematical problem, while at the same time offering few physical
measurements to inform the state estimation. Direct voltage angle measurements on a
feeder could vastly speed up and improve the accuracy of state estimation techniques.
90 A. Jain and S. Bhullar

(7) Reverse Power Flow:

A simple yet important aspect of the distribution system operating state is
reverse power flow on any line segment. The significance of reverse flow hinges on
the type of protection system design used by the utility, and whether the coordi-
nation of protective devices could be compromised under reverse flow conditions.
While some circuits may be able to safely backfeed all the way through the sub-
station, others could introduce problems that would be expensive to remedy with
bidirectional protection. One way to take advantage of lPMU data would be to
detect reverse power flow on any feeder segment with a minimal placement of
physical devices throughout the circuit.
Owing to the information conveyed by phase angle, fewer points may have to be
instrumented than with conventional current measurement, potentially making the
lPMU approach more economical.
(8) Renewable Generation Monitoring:
Besides line flows, a key aspect of situational awareness for distribution oper-
ators is knowledge of generation resources and loads on a circuit. With much DG
connected behind the meter, however, only net loads are visible to the operator.
This type of masking of generation and load compromises forecasting for both sides
of the equation and makes it difficult if not impossible to estimate N−1 contin-
gencies (such as a common-mode generation trip following a disturbance). It is
conceivable that analysis of lPMU data could help “unmask” net metered gener-
ation to assist in both distribution system operation and planning.
B. Control Applications:
Control applications include protective relaying under two-way flow, volt-VAR
optimization, coordination of resources on a micro-grid, intentional islanding and
resynchronization of micro-grids, and the creative recruitment of distributed
resources for ancillary services.
(1) Protective Relaying:
To employ different protection schemes that accommodate reverse flow safely is
one of the techniques. Developing the develop supervisory differential relaying
schemes based on lPMU data that does not require a costly replacement of pro-
tective devices.
(2) Volt-VAR Optimization:
We do not expect that voltage angle measurement would afford an inherent
advantage over magnitude for feeder voltage optimization, but the capability to
support this important function alongside other applications could add significantly
to the business case for lPnet deployment.
Micro-phasor Measurement Units (lPMUs) and Its Applications … 91

(3) Micro-grid Coordination:

To advance the opportunities for active control based on lPMU measurements,
we will study requirements for hierarchical, layered, distributed control of an
islandable cluster of aggregated distributed resources and identify the merits, if any,
of angle as a state variable. Micro-grid balancing and synchronization is an
application with a longer strategic time horizon, but one where the use of voltage
angle as a control variable is expected to be crucial.

5 Conclusions

These micro-phasor measurement units can be created more cheaply, an order of

magnitude less, than current commercial PMUs. For this reason, many more
lPMUs could be deployed and provide a much higher resolution of the distribution
grid. So, in this paper, the concepts like why we need micro-PMUs and its block
diagram are explained with the applications for synchrophasor technology in dis-
tribution systems.

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