EE 351: SMART GRID TECHNOLOGIES

Lecture:SCADA BASICS AND COMPONENTS

Dr Anil K Naik
Assistant Professor
Department of Electrical Engineering
National Institute of Technology, Warangal, India

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Introduction

• Automation is used worldwide in a variety of applications such as:

gas and petroleum industry,
power system automation,
building automation, to small manufacturing unit automation.
• The terminology SCADA is generally used when the process to be
controlled is spread over a wide geographic area, like power systems.
“SCADA systems are defined as a collection of equipment that will
provide an operator at a remote location with sufficient information to
determine the status of particular equipment or a process and cause
actions to take place regarding that equipment or process without
being physically present”.

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 Introduction…….contd
• SCADA implementation involves two major activities:
data acquisition (monitoring) of a process or equipment
and the supervisory control of the process, this leading to complete
automation.
• The complete automation of a process can be achieved by automating the
monitoring and the control actions.
The basic steps involved are:
• All the SCADA starts with field equipment which is being monitored and
controlled.
• The appropriate sensors pick up the parameters from the field equipment
and convert them in to voltage or current signals.
• These signals then conditioned and converted into digital form by means
of ADC.
• These electrical digital signals are then communicated to the server
through different devices and protocols depending up on the SCADA
structure.

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SCADA involved following steps

Every sector of the power system, from generation, to transmission to

distribution to the customer is being automated today to achieve
optimal use of energy and resources.
• Collect the data from the field.
• Convert the data into transmittable form.
• Bundle the data into packets.
• Transmit the packets of data over the communication media.
• Receive the data at the control center.
• Decode the data.
• Display the data at the appropriate points on the display screens of
the operator.

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 SCADA involved following steps

• The operator initiates the control

command.
• Bundle the control command as a
data packet.
• Transmit the packet over the
communication media.
• The field device receives and
decodes the control command.
• Control action is initiated in the
field using the appropriate device
actuation.

Note: The set of equipment measuring elements helps in acquiring the data
from the field, and the set of equipment controlling elements implements the
control commands in the field.
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 Components of SCADA systems
The SCADA system has four components:
1. Remote terminal unit (RTU) or data concentrator: which is the link of
the control system to the field, for acquiring the data from the field
devices and passing on the control commands from the control station
to the field devices.
Modern-day SCADA systems are incomplete without the data
concentrators and intelligent electronic devices (IEDs) which are
replacing conventional RTUs.

A front-end processor (FEP), or a communications front end (CFP), is a small-

sized computer which interfaces to the host computer a number of networks

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Components of SCADA systems
2. Communication system: that carries the monitored data from the RTU
to the control center and the control commands from the master station
to the RTU or data concentrator to be conveyed to the field.
3. Master station: is the third component of the SCADA system where the
operator monitors the system and makes control decisions to be conveyed
to the field.
4. Human-machine interface (HMI): which is the interaction between the
operator and the machine

Note: All automation systems essentially have these four components, in

varied proportions depending on the process requirements.

Power system SCADA systems are focused on the master stations and HMI is
of great significance, whereas process automation is focused on controllers,
and master station and the HMI has less significance.

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Remote terminal unit (RTU)
• The RTU is the eyes, ears, and hands of the SCADA system.
• In older days, RTU was a slave of the master station, but now RTUs are
equipped with internal computational and optimization facilities.
• RTU collects data from the field devices, processes the data, and sends
the data to the master station through the communication system to
assist the monitoring of the power system as “eyes” and “ears” of the
master station.
• At the same time, the RTU receives control commands from the master
station and transmits these commands to the field devices, thus
justifying the comparison to the “hands” of the master station.
• The location of the RTU and the communication front end/front-end
processor (CFE/FEP) of the master station can be seen in the previous
diagram.

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Evolution of RTUs

• From 1900 to the early 1920s, varieties of remote control systems

were developed by engineers for remotely supervising processes.
• In 1921 a system designed by John B. Harlow could automatically
detect a change of status at a remote station and could report the
change to the control center.
• In 1927 the first logging system, designed by Harry E. Hersey,
monitored information from a remote location and printed status
change with reported time and date.
• Supervisory systems evolved from electromechanical to using
solidstate components, electronic sensors, and analog-to-digital
converters. With the advent of microprocessors.
• Later, microprocessor-based logic was incorporated into the RTUs.
This increased the flexibility of supervisory systems and brought in
new capabilities in operation and performance.

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 Components of RTU

RTU has the following major components to accomplish

the tasks of monitoring and controlling the field device:

• Communication Subsystem
• Logic Subsystem
• Termination Subsystem
• Power Supply Subsystem
• Test/HMI Subsystem

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Components of RTU….Contd

Communication Subsystem:
• Communication subsystem is the interface between the SCADA communication
network and the RTU internal logic.
• This subsystem receives messages from the master, interprets the messages, initiates
actions within the RTU which in turn initiates some action in the field.
• RTU also sends an appropriate message to the master station on the completion of the
task.
• It also collects data from the field, and processes and conveys relevant data to the
master station.
• RTU may report to a single master or multiple masters.
Logic Subsystem:
• The logic subsystem is the central processing and control unit of the RTU.
• The logic subsystem consists of the main processor and database and handles all
major processing—time keeping, and control sensing.
• The logic subsystem also handles the analog-to-digital conversions and computational
optimization.

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 Components of RTU….Contd
Termination Subsystem:
• The termination subsystem provides the interface between RTU and external
equipment such as the communication lines, primary source, and substation
devices.
• RTU logic needs to be protected from the harsh environment of the substation.

Power Supply Subsystem:

The power supply converts primary power, usually from the substation battery, to the
supply requirements of the other RTU subsystems.

Test/HMI Subsystem:
This subsystem covers a variety of components, built-in hardware/firmware tests, and
visual indicators, within the RTU, and built-in or portable test/maintenance panels or
displays.

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 Advanced RTU functionalities

• With the advent of microprocessor

technology and with the integrated circuit–
based devices becoming cheaper by the
day, the RTUs also gained in functionality
and versatility.
• In the power industry, the major
advancements have been in the following
aspects:

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Flow of data from the field to the SCADA control center
• Starting from the substation bus bar in the field, the potential transformer
connected to the bus converts the 220 kV into 110 V.
• This 110 V is converted into a 4 to 20 mA analog signal by a voltage transducer.
• The 4 to 20 mA analog signal is converted to a digital signal by the analog input (AI)
module of the RTU.
• Further, this digital signal obtained is packaged into a data packet.
• The data packets are then transmitted to the master station along the
communication medium available.
• In the master station, the packets are received by the front-end
processor/communication front end (FEP/CFE), decoded, and the data retrieved

Note: The same sequence

could be retraced from
the master station to the
field, in the case of a
control command issued
by the operator, to be
executed in the field.
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Intelligent electronic devices (IEDs)

The industry standard definition of an IED is “Any device incorporating one

or more processors with the capability to receive or send data/control
from or to an external source (e.g., electronic multifunction meters, digital
relays, and controllers).”

• Recently, IEDs have been deployed extensively in power automation

systems and the shift from RTUs to IEDs is evident due to the integration
and interoperability features of the IEDs.

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Evolution of IEDs
• IEDs were introduced in the early 1980s with microprocessor-based
control features.
• The deployment of IEDs is revolutionizing the protection, substation and
distribution automation, and data capture and analysis functions of an
electric utility.
• The protection relay migrated from single-function conventional
electromechanical types to multi-function microprocessor-based relays
and started incorporating different protection functions.
• However, IED revolution started when other functionalities like accurate
voltage and current phasor measurement, waveform capture, and
metering were being incorporated into the relays.
• The growth in communication infrastructure, standardization of protocols,
and interoperability were major factors that led to the IED explosion.
• IEDs are now the eyes, ears, and hands of the automation systems in a
power utility.

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IED functional block diagram
• The modern IED architecture ensures that the device is multipurpose, modular
in nature, flexible and adaptable, and has robust communication capabilities.
• Communication capabilities include multiple selectable protocols, multi-drop
facilities with multiple ports, and rapid response for real-time data.
• IEDs also have tremendous data-processing capability for a variety of functions,
for various applications like protection and metering.
• IEDs have event recording capability that can be useful for post-event analysis,
for fault waveform recording, and for power quality measurements.
• IEDs can also accept and send out analog and digital signals with selectable
ratings, thus making the IEDs versatile.

Modern IED with the functional blocks. 17

IED functional block diagram
• As far as IED deployment in the field is concerned, Below Fig. gives a
complete picture of the IED integration with the devices connected and
the functionalities handled by the IEDs.
• The IED brings a relay panel with many single-function
electromechanical relays, control switches, extensive wiring, and much
more in a single box.

Functional view of modern IED. 18

IED functional block diagram
The IED also handles additional features like self and external circuit monitoring,
real-time synchronization of the event monitoring, local and substation data
access, programmable logic controller functionality, and an entire range of
software tools for commissioning, testing, event reporting, and fault analysis.
Typical relay IEDs are:

Relay IEDs. (Courtesy of GE.)

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Hardware and software architecture of the IED
IED hardware design utilizes draw out–type cards which is a great
advantage, as the replacement can be done easily without disconnecting
the terminal wires and removing the IED from the panel.

The IED software architecture is designed in such a way that the

commissioning engineer can easily evaluate and program the available
functions independently.

Common types of IEDs include protective relaying devices, tap changer

controllers, circuit breaker controllers, capacitor bank switches, recloser
controllers, voltage regulators etc

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 Functional blocks of IED

• The functional blocks in an IED

which demonstrate the versatility
of the device.
• In addition to the analog, digital
inputs and outputs, the IED has
the capability of waveform
capture and disturbance analysis
capability.

• Metering and demand values recording are other features, in addition to

programmable logic capability of the IEDs that eliminates an additional
programmable logic controllers (PLC) usage.
• Self and external circuit monitoring make the device extremely reliable and
reduce down time. 21
IED communication subsystem
• The IED should support different protocols for multi-port
communication and different media and should have flexible and
open communication architecture.

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IED advanced functionalities
1. Protection function including phasor estimation
• The protection function is the primary function of a relay IED, as IEDs are
primarily the improvement on the microprocessor-based relays.
• There are tremendous improvements in the new IEDs as more accurate
measurement principles and less auxiliary equipment are required.
• Auxiliary CTs can be eliminated in a transformer differential relay, as the
new relay has a CT mismatch correction function.

2. Programmable logic and breaker control

A modern relay IED eliminates the use of external programmable logic
controllers (PLCs) as the IED can handle logical inputs and outputs of the
protection functions, which can be connected to flip flops and/or gates of
the IED directly.

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IED advanced functionalities
3. Metering and power quality analysis
• Metering capabilities of the IEDs became acceptable to the power
utilities quickly, and major cost saving was achieved by combining the
metering function into the IEDs.
• It may be noted that the primary CTs and PTs for protection purposes
may not be accurate enough for normal current measurement for
metering.

4. Self-monitoring and external circuit monitoring

IEDs have card-level diagnostic capabilities for internal problems, with a
self-monitoring software, which can detect up to 98% of the problems,
such as hardware failure, memory failure, and power supply problems

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IED advanced functionalities
5. Event reporting and fault diagnosis
• Relay IEDs eliminate the digital fault recorders because waveform
recording during a fault can be performed by the IEDs, whereas the
electromechanical relays did not have such capability.
• Event reporting can be easily done by relay IEDs eliminating sequence
of events (SOE) recorders.
• The relay IEDs save the captured data in nonvolatile memory and
disturbance event reports (pick up, trip, and auto-reclose).
• Time stamping of all events is done by the IEDs, and GPS
synchronization for this purpose and a battery backup for the real-time
clock are essential.

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Some points for NOTE
• As discussed, IEDs are devices that can be connected to a LAN and
communicate with other devices over the LAN and have processing
capabilities.
• A large number of IEDs are available currently, relay IEDs being the
most commonly used for automation purposes.
• the smart meter used for home automation is an IED
• Digital fault recorders (DFRs) and remote terminal units (RTUs) are IEDs
with digital data transmission and reception capability with
computational facility built in.
• Therefore, IEDs have become the basic building blocks for automation
of power systems. However, it is not easy to replace all the existing RTU
and related equipment with IEDs.

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Data concentrators and merging units

Migration from RTU to IEDs and data concentrator to merging units and IEDs
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SCADA communication systems

The communication system plays a vital role in the SCADA

implementation, especially with many time critical applications in power
systems. The communication media and the protocols used in the power
system require special treatment.

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Master station
• The SCADA master stations range from small control rooms in a substation to
large transmission SCADA master stations manning the power flow of a whole
country.
• The master station is a collection of computers, servers, peripherals, and I/O
systems that help the operator to monitor the state of the field and initiate
control actions at the appropriate moment.
• The master station components can be classified into hardware and software
components.
Master station software components:
The master station software components can be broadly classified into two
categories: the basic SCADA functions and advanced application functions
pertaining to the specific SCADA implementation, like generation SCADA,
transmission SCADA, or distribution SCADA application.

Master station hardware components:

The main hardware in a master station will be the computer and server systems
used for executing the different tasks to be performed by the master station. The
computer servers must be selected based on the requirements of the master
station.
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Small, medium, and large master stations
• The sub-load dispatch center (LDC) is a small master station with a few RTUs
reporting via the CFE.
• The system will have a console for display and some local control if necessary.
• The routers for sending the data to the higher hierarchy and peripheral devices will
complete the components of the sub-LDC master station.

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Small, medium, and large master stations…contd
• A medium master station will have many servers, the SCADA/EMS server,
development server, information storage and retrieval (ISR), network management
server, inter-control center protocol server (ICCP), and a large number of operator
terminals for monitoring and control.

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Small, medium, and large master stations…contd
• A large master station with a dual redundant LAN, with all the components of the
medium master station, a few additional servers, and additional layers of security.

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HMI components
• In a SCADA system, the HMI components include operator console, operator
dialogue, mimic diagram and peripheral devices.
• The console where the operator monitors and controls the system is of utmost
importance and includes the visual display units, alphanumeric keyboard, cursor,
communication facilities.
• Generally for power system SCADA each operator has three to four monitors for
proper planning and multiple views.

Peripheral devices:
A dot-matrix printer is used to print alarms and events. It uses fanfold computer
paper. A color printer is used for capturing screen shots. A black and white laser
printer is used to print reports.

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SCADA in power systems
• SCADA systems are in use in all directions of power system operations starting from
generation, to transmission, to distribution, and to utilization of electrical energy.
• The SCADA functions can be classified as basic and advanced application functions.
• The basic SCADA functions include data acquisition, remote control, human machine
interface, historical data analysis, and report writing, which are common to
generation, transmission, and distribution systems.

SCADA advanced application functions 34

Generation SCADA application functions
Automatic Generation Control (AGC): a compendium of equipment and
computer programs implementing closed-loop feedback control of frequency
and net interchange.
Economic Dispatch Calculation (EDC): the scheduling of power from all
available sources in such a way to minimize cost within some security limit.
Interchange Transaction Scheduling (ITS): ensures that sufficient energy and
capacity are available to satisfy load energy and capacity requirements
Transaction Evaluation (TE): evaluates economy of transactions using the unit
commitment results as the base condition
Unit Commitment (UC): produces the hourly start-up and loading schedule
which minimizes the production cost for up to one week in the future
Short-Term Load Forecasting (STLF): produces the hourly system load for up
to one week into the future and is used as input to the unit commitment
program
Hydrothermal coordination: the scheduling of power from all available hydro
generation in such a way to minimize cost within constraints (e.g., reservoir
levels
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Transmission SCADA application functions

Network Configuration/Topology Processor: analyzes the status of circuit

breakers as well as measurements to automatically determine the current
model of the power system.
State Estimation: provides a means of processing a set of redundant
information to obtain an estimate of the state variables of the system.
Contingency Analysis: simulates outages of generating units and
transmission facilities to study their effect on bus voltages, power flows,
and the transient stability of the power system as a whole.
Three-Phase Balanced Power Flow: obtains complete voltage angle and
magnitude information for each bus in a power system for specified load
and generator real power and voltage conditions.
Optimal Power Flow: optimize some system objective function, such as
production cost, losses, and so on, subject to physical constraints on
facilities and the observation of the network laws.

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Distribution automation application functions
Distribution automation/distribution management systems (DA/DMS)
include substation automation, feeder automation, and customer
automation. The additional features incorporated in distribution
automation will be :
• Fault identification, isolation, and service restoration
• Network reconfiguration
• Load management/demand response
• Active and reactive power control
• Power factor control
• Short-term load forecasting
• Three-phase unbalanced power flow • Interface to customer
information systems (CISs)
• Interface to geographical information systems (GISs)
• Trouble call management and interface to outage management
systems (OMSs)

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Advantages of SCADA in power systems
• Increased reliability, as the system can be operated with less severe
contingencies and the outages are addressed quickly.
• Lower operating costs, as there is less personnel involvement due to
automation.
• Faster restoration of power in case of a breakdown, as the faults can be
detected faster and action taken.
• Better active and reactive power management, as the values are
accurately captured in the automation system.
• Reduced maintenance cost, as the maintenance can be more effectively
done with continuous monitoring of the equipment.
• Reduced human influence and errors, as the values are accessed
automatically, and the meter reading and related errors are avoided.
• Faster decision making, as a wealth of information is made available to
the operator about the system conditions to assist the operator in making
accurate and appropriate decisions.
• Optimized system operation, as optimization algorithms can be run and
appropriate performance parameters chosen.
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SCADA for Home

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Electrical Energy Management System and
SCADA in Power System

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SCADA monitoring

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