FPGA versus DSP for Wavelet transform based Voltage Sags detection

The detection of disturbances in electrical power systems must be as fast as possible to avoid serious consequences. The occurrence of sags, particularly in Wind Electrical Synchronous Generators, may cause failures or even the destruction of the generator. This paper presents a comparison between a FPGA and a DSP system for Voltage Sags detection. The use of Field Programmable Gate Arrays (FPGAs) and Digital Signal Processor (DSP) to monitor the quality of Electrical Power Systems allows the fast detection of sags and other related electric power disturbances. The developed system used a version of the Wavelet transform, the Redundant Discrete Wavelet Transform (RDWT), for the detection of the sags. For a fast Sag detection, the current and voltage wavelet coefficient energies were used. The results obtained show that both implementations, with FPGA and with DSP are efficient alternatives for the fast SAGs detection and can also be used to other power quality related disturbances monitoring.