Enhancement of distribution system protection through automatic network reconfiguration

Abstract

The distribution system is a key component of the power system since it delivers electricity to clients and is where revenue is collected. The distribution system is exposed to fault conditions. When these fault conditions strike, the distribution system's power lines are disturbed, and customers lose power. Power utilities lose revenue and battle to sustain power reliability standards. When the supply of power is not provided in agreement with the contract, power companies suffer penalties from their customers. In the past, electric companies used a “trouble call system” to detect outages, whereby consumers experiencing power outages would phone in and report them. The power utility would dispatch the field crew to restore power. Due to this method, customers will be out of supply for a long period of time. As a result, using the IEC 61850 GOOSE message application, this study developed a relay control technique to emulate the automatic reconfiguration of the distribution system under fault conditions. The designed technique is simulated and tested in a lab-scale environment.