Selecting calibration waveforms for power analyzers and meters under nonsinusoidal conditions

It is well known that power systems contain a great variety of distorted current, I, and voltage, V, waveforms. At present there is not a preferred set of test waveforms for the calibration of power analyzers (PA) and power meters (PM) under nonsinusoidal conditions. This paper proposes criteria for the selection of I and V waveforms that are likely to maximize the instrumentation errors in the measurement of I and V harmonics and power. The suggested waveforms make it possible to test both the dynamic range and the sampling synchronization mechanism of the PA. Errors exceeding 10% have been observed when calibrating a precision PA using these waveforms.