A HLA based simulator architecture for co-simulating ICT based power system control and protection systems

Power systems and especially Smart Grids increasingly apply Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for exchanging information over wide area networks. Here, the performance of the ICT has become crucial for the development of new Wide Area Monitoring, Protection And Control (WAMPAC) [1] systems. In this context, simulations are a common way for evaluation, but power systems and communication networks are usually analysed with dedicated simulators. Therefore a combined simulation for analysing the dynamics and mutual impacts of both domains is needed. In this paper we present a generic hybrid simulation architecture based on the IEEE standard 1516 - High Level Architecture [2] to enable a combined simulation of power systems and communication networks in an integrated simulation environment. First, we introduce our hybrid simulator architecture, along with the communication and synchronization process between sub-simulators. Secondly, we present our communication networks architecture for modelling the network traffic caused by the information transmitted by control and protection algorithms within the electrical transmission system. Finally, we introduce our modelling approach for mapping entities between the power systems and the communication networks. For this purpose, we introduce our concept of a Substation Data Processing Unit, which represents entities on substation level by providing an IEC 61850 [3] based model for mapping logical functions for local process control, implementing decentralized protection and control algorithms and providing additional components for the power systems (e.g Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs) [4]).