The Intelligent Digital Substation - Future Proof by Design A combination of societal, technological, and environmental factors are transforming the energy industry in-depth. The continuous increase of renewable and intermittent energy sources; the necessity to improve grid reliability and power quality; and regulatory pressure to reduce operating expenditures on grid assets require investments today while being future proof for decades to come. Electrical grids are evolving in complexity, in structure and in function to enable the bi-directional flow of energy, of information and transactions. The integration of distributed, intermittent energy resources require constant network balancing, real-time adjustments of supply and demand, dynamic asset rating, dynamic protection schemes, advanced automation and is only possible with a new substation platform. Electrical substations are the critical nodes of this grid evolution and hence in order to make the grid digital and intelligent we need first to make substations digital and intelligent. SASensor is architected along the Centralized Protection and Control principles and provides already today the benefits of a data driven and software defined implementation. This is making your investments future proof as functions can merely be applied by software upgrades during the entire life cycle of the substation. SASensor is a substation platform transforming your substations into intelligent hubs providing a new level of functionalities, applications and performance, a new level of situational awareness and high resolution real-time data providing insight into operation, diagnostics and asset conditions. SASensor is providing a large set of protection, automation, communication and measurement functionalities based on a high availability redundant computing platform with efficient remote software-, data-, user- and configuration management along with resilient cyber-security features.

1. TUA09
Substation Intelligence
Software Defined Digital Substation Automation
Based on the Centralized Protection and Control Architecture
Bastian Fischer, Locamation
June 27th 2017, Wroclaw, Poland

2. Content
• Context
• Software Defined Everything (SDx)
• Software Defined Substation
– SDx Substation Architecture
– SDx Centralized Protection and Control
– SDx Benefits
• Outlook and Conclusion

3. Context
• Rapid deployment of distributed energy resources
require new approach for automation, control and
protection based on deep substation intelligence
• Rapid obsolescence of current deployed discrete,
functional limited fit for purpose dedicated devices
• Rapid increase of innovation cycles and rapid
increase of cyber threats require frequent upgrade
of functionalities and cyber security patterns
 Decoupling of software from specific hardware

4. Software Defined Everything
Decoupling of software from specific hardware
• Telecommunication and IT have already separated
functions from hardware by adopting software-
defined everything (aka SDx)
• SDx reduces the hardware dependence by moving
functions to a more dynamic platform of software
• SDx in Utilities targets any physical item (such as
i.e. IED, RTU) that can be performed by software
SDx provides
functional flexibility
and intelligence
Discrete Device Software defined device

5. Software Defined Substation
SDx introduces functional flexibility and simplicity
High fidelity Voltage, Current, IO Sensor
+ High performing redundant Computing Platform
+ Realtime Firmware and Software Applications
= Software Defined Substation Intelligence
based on IEEE Centralized Protection and Control

6. Software Defined Substation
Designed from the ground up to leverage the
benefits of the software defined paradigm. This
will provide substation intelligence and enable
the digital substation by design

7. SDx – Platform benefits
The SASensor platform concept consists of a
layered integrated hardware, firmware, software
and data services architecture engineered to
work together, providing benefits like:
• Maximum flexibility with future proof functionality
• Shorter cycle from design, development and roll-out
• Faster innovation cycles for functions and algorithms
• Faster maturation of hardware and software functions
• Increased productivity with less obsolescence
• Invoke and valorize developed applications of knowledge institutes or
specialized third party software development companies
• Enablement of data-driven, on premise, hybrid or cloud based machine
learning algorithm
• Optimizing the Total Cost of Ownership for the distribution system owner
• Intelligent triggering, storage and analysis of equipment signatures for
asset health indicators and condition based maintenance
• Preparation of deep machine learning algorithm

8. SDx – Reliability benefits
The SASensor SDx platform is designed
with inherently built-in redundancy.
All functionality is implemented in the
Central Control Unit only, redundancy is
achieved by doubling the CCU into two
independent fully autonomous systems.
SASensor Reliability
• CIM/BIM/VIM interface module can be doubled for n-1
• Calculation of a stream of sample-by-sample value based on Kirchoff law
• Inherent robust with internal self-diagnostics and incident logs
Asset Reliability / Availability
• Online upgrade of the system possible without outage
• Advanced asset signature recording for breaker, transformer, cable analysis

9. SDx – Future Proof by Design
The SASensor SDx provides a rich
set of substation functions for
automation, protection and control
• Control and data acquisition functions,
• Alarm/event recording, protocol support,
• graphical HMI for operation and control
• High fidelity, high speed data
• Enabling rich portfolio of protections
• Release-, User- and configuration mgnt.
• Embedded cyber security framework
• Extension concept via Function Blocks and
Graphical application builder

10. SDx – Financial Benefits
The Software Defined Substation definition provides inherent
CAPEX, OPEX benefits along with 90% cupper reduction and
significant smaller space and real-estate requirements

11. Conclusion:
Software Defined Substation
• Software defined centralized protection and
control architecture is proven
• Over 200+ installation worldwide accumulating
more than 8.0+ million safe, secure and reliable
operating hours
• Dedicated Working Groups in IEEE and CIGRE as
well as a network of partners and universities are
constantly extending the software defined
centralized protection and control architecture
• Future proven and extensible via rich library of
function block and data analysis

12. Appendix: Paper
12

13. Want to learn more …
contact us at
info@Locamation.com
Locamation is leader in Software Defined CPC Substation Automation
➢ More than 150 installations across Europe and China from 400kV to 10 kV
➢ Over 10+ million operating hours
➢ Seven-Nines 99.99999% of system availability