The Azerbaijani experiences in Digital Substation
deployment. How Process Bus and IEC 61850 addresses
utility requirements
SAEID SHOARINEJAD JORGE SECO; JORGE CÁRDENAS
Araz Energy GE Digital Energy
Azerbaijan Spain
1. Abstract
IEC 61850 has become the Standard to be used in Modern Substations due to the multiple
advantages that it brings to the different stakeholders involved during substation lifecycle.
There are many examples of substations using IEC 61850 IEDs (mostly protection relays) and
many papers from several manufacturers and from different users at various locations have
already discussed about the multiple advantages of using this Standard. This paper will show
the experience of Araz Energy using a Process Bus Solution in four 110 KV (as retrofitted
projects) Substations in Azerbaijan.
Araz Energy proposal to BEG (Baku Electric Grid that is locally called “Baki Elektrik Shabakasi/
BES”) was based on the Hard Fiber Process Bus system made by General Electric-Multilin (as
part of General Electric Digital Energy). The use of the Process Bus System is key as it brings all
the benefits of a Digital Substation and regular SAS (Substation Automation System and some
vendors call “DCS” for Substation Automation) and implies changes in the way a traditional
substation is being designed, built, serviced and maintained. The experience described in this
paper is based on the feedback gained and learned lessons from all perspectives in practice
from four different substations where the same concept was applied. Since then, and thanks
to the lessons learned and feedback received from the different actors participating in these
four different projects, the use of Digital Substations has become a landmark in the way
Substations should be designed, operated & maintained.
This paper will discuss all the challenges, lessons, obstacles, experiences and advantages
learned during the implementation of these Substations
KEYWORDS
Digital Substation, IEC 61850, Process Bus, Protection Relay, Substation Automation System
(SAS); IED (Intelligent Electronic Device), PM (Predictive Maintenance)
2. Introduction
Utilities (worldwide) have always had a conservative approach to new technologies. This is
particularly true in large companies having a significant installed base. Any change in the way
new substations are being designed, built/retrofitted/renovated, operated and maintained has
to be carefully revised in order to make sure total costs of ownerships are under control with
minimum downtime for the existing substations (under retrofit/renovate/extension).
The introduction of Substation Communication Standard IEC 61850 meant a significant change
in the way the whole substation should be understood. It also opened up Substations and the
Power System in general to the bunch of new features that the Digital Substation brings.
The latest step in substation developments comes with the implementation of Process Bus
concept. Process Bus is a subset of IEC 61850 Standard that enables the digitization of
conventional primary-equipment-related values without waiting for primary equipment’s
manufactures to convert their analog signals to digital signals inside their own equipment in
future (e.g. USB output on switchgear, etc.) and/or new equipment comes to the market or
being used in future (e.g. optical CTs and PTs)
Process Bus has been part of IEC 61850 Standard since the beginning, but due to technological
issues and the lack of product offering made that the number of installations using Process Bus
is still very limited so far, but we are confident that it would be digested and accepted by all
utilities worldwide so quickly in very new future. Most of the installations using IEC 61850 are
limited to the connection of level 1 IEDs to level 2 and the use of GOOSE messages between
level 1 devices. Some manufacturers, like GE offer a sound technical Process Bus solution and
enable all the different advantages of the full digital substation.
2.1 Process Bus Architecture:
Primary equipment has traditionally been connected to protection and control devices
using copper wires (even in substations with SAS).
Figure 1
This traditional way of making the connections leads to a significant engineering effort, as
thousands of different cables needed to be routed, installed, commissioned and maintained.
Process Bus Standard, as described in IEC61850-9-2, helps reducing dramatically costs and
engineering efforts during installation and maintenance, resulting in less costs and enhanced
security. Process Bus eliminates the need for thousands of different copper cables for controls
& analog signals and substitutes them with fewer fiber optic ones (Plug & Play) . Figure 2
shows this concept. Digitization of primary equipment can be achieved with the use of a
Process Interface Unit (PIU), as it’s also called “Brick” in GE system, installed close to the
primary equipment in the substation switchyard. This PIU converts the analog signals of the
primary equipment (i.e. Current, Voltage, breaker status and others) into digital signals. No
need to duplicate signals or use interposing transformers.
Figure 2
2.2 Digital Substation:
In order to get all the benefits that a full digital substation brings, special attention must be
paid to Substation Design, because this decision affects all aspects of the project. The most
evident sections are Substation layout, number of P&C panels, size of control room, the
number of copper cables, the type of the required equipment and related sections’ change. It
will also change the way project engineering is done from the Protection & control and
generally SAS aspects. Engineering procedures, interconnection drawings, panels’ shop
drawings (such as wiring connections, terminal list, cable schedule, etc.), configurations,
maintenance, control room design and size, cables’ routes, trays and canals are also done in a
different way. This fact is probably the most important reason for utilities to change their
minds and designs (especially inside cities that land is so expensive) concerning building
Substations in a classical/ conventional way. A radical change in staff philosophy (such as their
knowledge in working with computers, software, etc.) is required in order to embrace this new
way of conceiving Substations.
For many utilities, this change of philosophy in the design of substations’ P&C/SAS is a
challenge that must be overcome through the involvements of manufacturers, installers and
end users in the transferring of knowledge with the aim of an economical, appropriate and
suitable operation and maintenance ( including Predictive Maintenance) of substation assets
(Asset Management). Likewise, and due to the continuous development of new products with
increased capabilities of communication, safety, security and reliability, it is important to
design substations in a way that equipment expansion (e.g. adding a new bay) and update
would be possible in a quick and cost-effectively manner
Process Bus architecture used for Dagliq substation is depicted in Figure 3. Number of
PIU/Bricks and their connections are shown on the drawing.
Figure 3
3. Opportunity description
In 2008 BEG / BES opened the project to retrofit DAGLIQ substation (except the transformers).
DAGLIQ is a distribution substation with different voltage levels (110/35/10 KV) consisting of
two incomer lines at 110kV, two 40MVA power transformers, and 53 medium voltage feeders
(35 & 10kV). The local power company, BEG, wanted to retrofit the substation due to its age.
The first approach to this job was to substitute old equipment with new one, following the
same classical approach. This meant changing the old P&C equipment with new digital relays,
updating old schemes and following the same principles originally used.
Retrofitting of this substation was framed in the efforts of the power company in updating
their facilities and thus reduces CAIDI & SAIDI rates. In addition, there was an interest in
finding a solution to the growing need to find new ways to act more quickly and effectively in
the event of occurrence of any electrical failure, increase the safety of its personnel, drastically
reduce time and the costs of construction, operation and have a solution that would allow the
easy expansion of the facilities.
Solution to be adopted should address the current and future challenges of the utility, being
the most important ones:
Cost of installation & maintenance
Time required to complete the job
Number of utility staff required to be involved in the project
Future proof design
Easy to be upgraded / interoperability
Level of autonomy to make simple changes
Safety of the maintenance crew / time required to perform routine tests
Remote controlling by SCADA center through gateway (Protocols IEC 101, 104
where fiber optic cable or OPGW were/are available instead of adding RTU,
marshaling rack, etc.)
Saving control room building size and the related costs for new substations
Considerable saving with deleting BCR (Bay Control Room) inside switchyard in
substations with regular SAS
Minimizing power downtime during Process Bus equipment and system
installation for existing/under operation substations that is very critical point
for the regions with high density loads and/or important consumers/facilities
Overall saving in time
Overall saving in costs of electrical sector
Overall saving in cost of civil works (size of control room because of much less
control panels than conventional P&C and regular SAS, cable canals and trays,
etc.)
The proposed solution was the substation completely digital using all the potential of the IEC
61850 Standard advantages. Initially, electric company was reluctant to this solution due to the
absence of monitoring and automation in substations and lack of technical skills in IEC 61850.
Finally, due to the quantifiable benefits that the full digital substation proposal brought, made
the utility order a pilot project to Araz Energy to build a proof of concept substation. Target
was to evaluate from first hand all the advantages that the new design should carry. Araz
Energy proposal was backed with its extensive experience building substations and the
technical support from GE Digital Energy.
4. Transmission & Distribution Substations in Azerbaijan
Transmission & distribution substations in Azerbaijan were of old technology. Most of them
were and several of them are still 40 or more years old and are based on the
electromechanical technology. Since the first installation, some of them have been upgraded
using a variety of different technologies and manufacturers. The result of all this is an old
installed base combined with newer protection relays of different manufacturers and
technologies. Engineering, Operation & Maintenance staff still follows the same old approach
to run the installations; however, the staffs’ mentality has considerably changed after
operation of those substations
5. Araz-GE proposal & challenges
Solution proposed was, as mentioned before, a full Digital Substation. The use of Process Bus
was key in achieving many of the proposed targets as it enabled huge savings. As the utility
had no real experience in using IEC 61850, Araz Energy leaded this project as EPC, being also
responsible for the engineering of the project. BEG took the responsibility of building P&C
panels, cabling and installation manpower.
Dagliq Substation’s voltage level is 110/35/10kV. Substation Single Line Diagram is depicted in
Figure 4. A number of 8 hard fiber PIUs/Bricks were used to protect the HV part of the
Substation.
Figure 4
Hard fiber PIUs were connected to the line, CTs, PTs and power transformer protection relays,
using fiber optics, avoiding most of the traditional field wiring. Fiber optic cables were in turn
connected to patch panel installed inside the control panels located in the Control building and
routed to the corresponding protection relays.
Hard Fiber PIU and patch panel units are depicted in Figure 5 &6 respectively for reference
Figure 5
Figure 6
The way PIUs and relays are connected is very straightforward and allows the use of the same
signal to four different protection relays. Synchronization of samples is always ensured
because of the four independent Digital cores that the PIU has. This feature permits a
considerable saving in hardware as one hard fiber can share samples between four different
IEDs. Sampling is independent for each core and is managed by every protection relay. This
system avoids the need for the use of any merging unit and solves the main technical issue of
sample synchronization. A typical connection scheme is shown in Figure 7. As it was mentioned
before and depicted on figure 6, all connections to the PIUs, between PIU & the patch panel
and between relays & the patch panel(s) are “Plug & Play”, i.e. the related cables and
connectors to PIUs, the patch panels and relays are all prepared in the factory and not in the
site with no way to connect to a wrong female terminals on the PIUs, the patch panels and
relays, therefore, that is why it is called “Plug & Play” that makes huge saving in time and
skilled labors during installation and commissioning.
Figure 7
The scope of this project included also a complete SAS for this Substation. Araz Energy
designed a complete Automation System maximizing IEC 61850 benefits.
All four substations with Process Bus have gateway, GE UPS for redundant severs, monitors
and printers, LVDC/LVAC panels, 120 VDC batteries and redundant chargers; and the last three
of them have 68” DLP as monitor for the single line diagram of the substation, real time values,
breakers’ status (provided by GE Power software package for Substation Automation) and so
on.
6. Proposed Solution advantages
The implementation of a full Digital Substation faced some challenges but also brought many
benefits to both the EPC and the utility.
Most of the challenges faced during this first Pilot project were related to the use of new tools
and a new engineering concept, different from the conventional approaches for regular SAS
that we had several experiences in that since 2000. New skills were required, primarily by the
protection engineers, as the development of a new concept of standard substation needed to
be built. As an example, the old interconnection schemes were substituted by using digital
signals that the different protection relays can interchange between them. This is being
achieved by GOOSE messages that IEC 61850 enables. Change from “hardware” to “software”
world required engineers to be trained in the new software tools and its capabilities. The use
of digital tools to substitute hardware brings many benefits in terms of flexibility, material cost
saving and much less man-hours during substation construction than conventional and regular
SAS. These benefits are also present during the operation of the substation, as reliability of
new systems has been enhanced. The use of digital signals brings also benefits in safety as
there is less need for operators to work with live parts (in reality, substations with regular and
Process Bus SAS package could be simply unmanned). Also there is a huge improvement in
reliability and time required for maintenance and PM as the SAS checks continuously “System
Health” and stores periodically measures, events, profiles, etc. Digital relays allow a better
analysis of faults with retrieving the stored Oscillographies, Sequence of Events and sending
faults’ details to the remote operator & maintenance experts in their headquarter with hugely
saving in maintenance &restoring costs and the experts’ time (as all utilities have shortages in
such experts worldwide) in analyzing the faults, symptoms & remedies, finding reliable ways to
fix the faults/problems and quickly restore the substation & grid with no need to physically go
the substations especially when the substations are far from city centers, rush hours’
congested traffics, bad weather, etc.. Outage time is therefore reduced with saving
considerable money for utilities.
The use of Process Bus technology resulted in saving time (big time) especially for retrofitting
the existing substations, because less time and resources were required:
Installations were made easier as there was no need to change existing
trenches outside and channels and inside the control room
Less P&C panels were need
Big reduction in testing and commissioning the whole installation
Figure 8
For the first installation, it was required to add a conventional mimic diagram on the P&C
panels as well, because this was a new concept for them and wanted to be sure that they
would be able to operate the installation in a traditional fashion (see figure 9). Manual
operation of switchgears was also possible. This fact increased the number of cables
(conventional) and extra panel space (resulting in additional costs). The advantages found with
this new technology, reduced costs and saving time in this project, convinced BEG to use the
same technology in the new substations that were to be built for one of the most important
events celebrated in Azerbaijan with international relevance, the Eurovision Song contest
hosted in Baku during May 2012.
Figure 9
This first substation was not only used as a proof of concept, it, also, was the base for the
standard substations to be built in the next future in the area.
The new Digital Substation and the use of Process Pus simplify and make it possible to make
standard designs that can be easily replicated in different substations (thanks to its flexibility).
This fact reverts in additional cost reductions in the construction of new installations, easier
and shorter maintenance and higher security to utility crew.
Figure 10
A comparison between the traditional and the Process Bus solution is summarized in table 1:
Traditional Hard-Wired Copper Solution Presented Process Bus Solution
Materials Multiple small, individual materials are Materials become finite set of
procured and installed as customized standard components, with a
individual components of the system small number of each type
Material quantity and type requirements Materials common across all
vary from zone to zone and apparatus to zones and stations
apparatus due to variability in wiring Vast majority of physical system
can be assembled in a controlled
environment
Higher initial material cost for
initial zone installed, with
material costs greatly reduced for
adjacent zones
Control buildings greatly reduced
in size due to elimination of most
bulky copper cables, terminal
racks and AC and DC FT type test
switches on relay panels.
Engineering Variability in engineering design largely in Physical interfaces between
physical copper connections merging unit and IED
Different applications require specialised standardised
designs to cater for different apparatus, Only minor physical variability in
different topologies mapping origins and destination
Design changes require significant manual of signals and information
labour to implement changes in the Majority of variability transferred
details of the copper connectivity into software configuration
Firmware, settings and other
engineering tools as simple as
today
Drafting Labour Significant manual labour is required to Only documentation required for
document individual copper connections copper connections is in primary
throughout the system apparatus which can be
Modification or addition to the standardised to equipment type
connectivity requires manual revisions to and specified as deliverable as
a potentially large number of drawings part of purchase of apparatus
Manual drafting is error prone and Documentation of connectivity
requires extensive, labour-intensive vastly reduced and simplified to
crosschecking and errors are often single point-to-point fibre
missed. connections that can be
summarized in tabular form
Facilitates automatically
generated system and
connection documentation
Traditional Hard-Wired Copper Solution Presented Process Bus Solution
Construction Time-consuming manual labour has to be Construction effort vastly
done in-situ where labour rates are reduced for copper connections –
generally higher and productivity virtually eliminated where
generally lower, and is susceptible to merging units are installed by
errors apparatus manufacturer
Some improvement can be realized with Chance for errors vastly reduced
the concept of pre-constructed, pre- through standard physical
tested control buildings but the variability connectivity
with the termination of field cables Faster installation of pre-
persists constructed control buildings
through simplified interface point
to switchyard
Commissioning Integrity of each copper signal path via Continuous monitoring of
copper cabling needs to be verified architecture reduces protection
between switchyard and IED misoperations from incorrect
Errors in the physical wiring, regardless of isolation or restoration following
the source, require troubleshooting and protection testing [5]
rework Construction errors limited to
provisioning of communication
between origin and destination
of information
No high energy signals (AC or DC)
present in the control building for
greater personnel safety when
working on protection and
control systems
Ongoing Maintenance activities currently risk- Continuous self-monitoring of all
Maintenance based or calendar-based, except in the hardware and redundant
event of spontaneous failure or measurements allows
misoperation maintenance to be condition-
Routine testing requires isolation of high- based (event-driven, e.g. run-to-
energy signals from primary apparatus fail)
Isolation and restoration of individual Continuous monitoring of
test/isolation points across multiple architecture reduces protection
panels error-prone and risk misoperation misoperations from incorrect
of protection isolation or restoration following
protection testing [5]
No high energy signals (AC or DC)
present in the control building for
greater personnel safety when
working on protection and
control systems
Switchyard Changes to the switchyard normally Multiple cores in a merging unit
Modifications require significant addition or allow for additional zones to
modification to existing control cables make use of unused capacity
and wiring within the merging unit
Time needed to make these changes and Each zone can be conveniently
the associated costs are directly related engineered, installed and
to the number and variability in copper commissioned individually
connections without impacting adjacent zones
Reduced outage impact and complexity until final testing is to be
through reduced number of copper performed
connections to be cut over.
Traditional Hard-Wired Copper Solution Presented Process Bus Solution
Project Amount of manual labour results in long Procurement, engineering,
Management project pipelines for design, construction construction more standardised
and commissioning with fewer handoffs and
Many hand-offs between stages in increased productivity
project result in many potential Up front decisions for material
bottlenecks planning simplified, detailed
design work can be done without
complete physical details of
installation
Operations Periodic testing of protection and Redundancy and self-monitoring
automation systems required reduces or eliminates the need
Troubleshooting and replacement of for periodic testing
failed components result in long Mean Connectorized cabling, no
Time To Repair and potentially extend internal settings on merging units
outage duration facilitate fast replacement
without requiring long outages to
re-commission protection and
control systems
Table 1 [4]
Figure 11
After the construction of this pilot substation three more Transmission & Distribution
substations were built using the same technology to leverage all the advantages described
earlier and take the full advantage of the new possibilities that Digital Substations bring.
Araz Energy signed EPC contract for all three substations at the end of July 2011, and
commissioned them in following months:
1. Bayil in Oct. 2011
2. 227 in December 2011 (figures 8, 9, 10 and 11)
3. DARNAGHOL in January 2012
Reduction in time achieved in the execution of the main tasks is resumed in the following
table*:
Process Regular SAS
Task Difference ( in days)
Bus way
Engineering (Detailed &
50 days 90 days 40
complete Design)
Panels' production & wiring 30 days 90 days 60
Installation and cabaling 30 days 60 days 30
Test and commissioning 30 days 90 days 60
Relay configuration 45 days 30 days -15
Total 185 360 175
Table 2
*Note: Above-mentioned specific statistic data (tables and figures) is based on following
parameters in Azerbaijan that would be different in other countries (based on local
requirements, regulations, specifications and layouts, manpower’s’ rate of performances &
skills, etc. :
1. Manpower (culture, efficiency, expertise, etc.)
2. When the customer asks for Process Bus system plus conventional mimic for
manual controlling as well; otherwise, installation and cabling will decrease
from 30 days to 15 days, test & commissioning from 30 days to 15 days and
relay configuration from 45 days to 30 days
3. Coordination with the other disciplines (switchyard equipment, canals for
cables, constructions of structures, control room, etc.) in the country
4. This table is for the substations under retrofit and renovation, so it would be
different for a new substation (much less time is required)
5. Configuration time decreases over more practices to much less than required
times for regular SAS substations because of modularity and typicality of the
Process Bus System. So the showed numbers are average, and we do believe it
would be 20 to 25 days for our future project (depends on the size substations,
number of relays, number of bays, etc.).
6. All mentioned percentages on the tables 2 and 3 and graphs of 4 & 5 will
definitely vary with voltage level, number of bays, incoming and outgoing
feeders, switchgear configurations, and so on
Overall savings with using this new Digital Substation Process Bus design: 49% (as per above-
mentioned notes and facts).
This result is similar to what we found in other projects using Process Bus.[4]
Task Savings
Engineering 45%
Drafting 56%
Construction 67%
Commissioning 47%
Total 54%
Table 3 [4]
Cost breakdown for traditional
Total Project hard-wired solution:
Budget (Hard-Wired)
of $407,000
Engineering
18%
Drafting
10%
Materials Labour
27% 73% Construction
21%
Commissioning
24%
Process Bus project cost breakdown comparison for a project having the same budget as Table
3[4] :Equivalent Project Budget (Process Bus)
of $407,000
Engineering
10%
Drafting
Labour 4%
34%
Labour
Materials Construction
42% 73% 7%
Commissioning
13%
Savings
25%
Table 4 [4]
7 Conclusions
The use of IEC 61850 Standard in substations means bringing clear advantages compared to
the traditional way of designing, operating and maintaining Electric Substations. Although
Process Bus reinforces the advantages found with IEC 61850, but its adoption by utilities has
been slow. Electric utilities used to argue that the technology was not mature enough, even
though GE has a technically working solution since 2008 with tenths of installations working
worldwide. The main reason behind this slow adoption is that this new concept requires a
disruptive change in utility mindset. A considerable effort is required to understand, train and
implement changes to adopt the old hardware-minded structures and start thinking in the
advantages that this new technology brings to all the stakeholders. A special effort must be
done in continuously training in order to keep updated and get the maximum benefit from the
new technologies. Full benefits of the new technologies are only gained if utility engineering,
operation and maintenance crew are trained on a regular basis and time by time.
Summary of the benefits perceived and measured from this project by the utility:
Time reduction:
Standardization 44% time reduction in Substation Detailed Design and shop drawings
Wiring : 67% less time needed for wiring works
Cable trays and canals/trenches: 70% less cost and time needed for cable trays’
installations and making canals/trenches for the cables
Installation: 50% less man-hours during installation works (this will decrease a lot over
time after more practices)
Start-up: 67% less time needed for commissioning and testing(this will decrease a lot
over time after more practices)
Configuration : 50% more time needed for IED set ups(this will decrease a lot over time
after more practices)
Documentation (e.g. “As Built Drawings”): 65% less time needed for documentations
because of the system’s modularity and typicality
Number of cores of CT and their burdens would be decreased including its costs
Less P&C panels (much lower costs for making and wiring panels in Process Bus System
versus conventional and regular SAS)
Less civil/ construction costs of control room versus conventional and regular SAS
substations
The overall time reduction is close to 50%. The only aspect where more effort was
required was during configuration stage; however, the configuration time gets less and
less after more practices because of modularity and typicality. We have to note that this
time can also be drastically reduced if substation configuration is standardized.
Difference in material cost is very similar if we compare the regular SAS versus the
Digitized Substation (with Process Bus). Switchgear Costs are lower in the conventional
substation, while the Digital Substation with Process Bus uses less copper and less
hardware (less IEDs, no DI, no DO, no AI and no AO on the relay and their related wirings in
the control panels, less cores in CTs, no BCR, etc.).
Taking into account the different aspects involved in the lifecycle costs, advantages
exceeds dramatically disadvantages in all aspects, being economics and implementation
time, only 2 of them. Some of the Advantages found are listed below:
Flexible. Changes and upgrades are easily made through software
Enables standardization. Same configuration can be used in similar installations
Open. IEC 61850 makes it possible to use equipment from different vendors
Scalable. Process Bus and the concept of IEC 61850 make it easy to make a design
based on building blocks, easily expandable
Safer. Digital systems avoid the use of live wires and enhances crew safety
Future proof. IEC 61850 has been designed to accept older and nowadays’ versions
of primary equipment of substations to maximize backwards compatibility
Easier maintenance & applying full PM. Digital systems check continuously the
status of the connections and the health of the different IEDs. It is, also, possible to
keep historic records of the installations and to save pre-fault status to make a
root cause analysis. Also, the system is easily maintainable (just replacing PIU with
a new one during less than 30 minutes, changing power supply and CCU cards
inside the relays during 15 minutes, and so on)
Leaving existing cables of conventional substations on the trenches/ canals as are
to save more costs concerning under retrofit/renovate substations when the case
is urgent
8 References
[1] Simplifying protection system design for distribution substations. Rich Hunt, John Coursey,
Stephen Hirsch, Jorge Cardenas
[2] IEC 61850-9-2 Process Bus: operation experience in a real environment. Jorge Cardenas,
Iñaki Ojanguren, Ignacio Garces. CIRED 2011
[3] Feedback on On-Service Deployment of the Fully Digital Substation. RICHARDS, S. 1,
PAVAIYA, N. 1, BOUCHERIT, M. 2, FERRET, P. 2, VANDELEENE. Cigré 2014
[4]Considerations for IEC 61850 Process Bus deployment in real-world protection and control
systems: a business analysis. M. ADAMIAK , B. KASZTENNY ,J. MAZEREEUW D. MCGINN
S.HODDER ,