Challenges in Power Systems

State Estimation

Lamine Mili

Virginia Tech
Alexandria Research Institute

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 Control Center

: P and Q measurements
n = 2N -1 1.5 m / n 3
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High voltage and high current

CT
0 to 5 A

I Q P V

10 k

0 to 10 V

ADC

12 bit binary data

Control Center 3
 Types of Measurement Errors
Random errors - related to the class of precision of
the instrument.

Intermittent errors burst of large noise or

temporary failures in the communication channels.

Systematic errors introduced by

the nonlinearity of the current transformers and
capacitor coupling voltage transformers (CCVT);
Deterioration of instrument with time, temperature,
weather, and other environmental causes.
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P1 P2 P3

500 KV Bus

T1 T2

230 KV Bus

S1 S2 S3 S4

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 Meter Values (treatments) in p.u.
1.05

S3
1.04
6 kV S4

1.03
S1,T1,T2

1.02 S2

1.01

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0 50 100 150 200 250 300
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Snap-shots (blocks)
 Measurement Calibration
The present practice is to perform an on-site
calibration, which is rarely carried out.

The measurements may be strongly biased.

Develop a remote measurement calibration

method that minimizes the systematic errors in
the measurements.
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 Power System State Estimation

Provide an estimate for all metered and

unmetered quantities;

Filter out small errors due to model

approximations and measurement inaccuracies;

Detect and identify discordant measurements,

the so-called bad data.
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 Power System Model
The system is balanced.
The line parameters are perfectly known.
The topology is known.
No time-skew between measurements.
R jX

j C /2 j C /2

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Probability Distribution of Measurement Errors

f(x)
Gaussian
Actual distibution
distribution

x
0 3

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 Breakdown Point of an Estimator
The breakdown point is defined as the maximum
fraction of contamination that an estimator can handle

True value

bias mean

Breakdown point of least-squares estimator is = 0 %

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 Breakdown Point of Sample Median
True value

median

median

bias median
m 1
Breakdown point of L1-norm estimator is = [

]/ m
2 12
Maximum bias curve of the sample median
Maximum Bias

0
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
Fraction of contamination
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 z = ax + b min ri
i
z

4 Vertical outlier

0
0 2 4 6 x
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 z = ax + b
min ri
z i

Bad leverage
4 point

Critical value of x
0
0 2 4 6 8 10 x
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Leverage Points in Power Systems
These are distant points (outliers) in the space spanned
by the row vectors of the Jacobian matrix.

They are power measurements on relatively short

lines.

They are power injection measurements on buses with

many incident lines.

Leverage measurements tend also to make the

Jacobian matrix ill-conditioned.
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 Leverage Point Processing
Develop robust covariance method for identifying
outliers in an n-dimensional point could.

Minimum volume ellipsoid method is a good

candidate, but it is computationally intensive.

Projection methods are fast to calculate.

Develop estimation methods that can handle bad

leverage points.
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 Topology Error Identification
A topology error is induced by errors in the status
of the circuit breakers of a line, a transformer, a
shunt capacitor, or a bus coupler.
Assumed Actual

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 All the measurements associated with a topology
error will be seen as conforming bad data by the
state estimator. The state estimator breaks down.

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 Proposed Solution
Develop a preprocessing method that does not
assume that the topology as given.
In this model, the state variables are the power
flows of all the branches, be they energized or not.

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 xPi

Pkl x pi

Plk x pi 2 Gkl (1 cos( X kl xPi ))

Losses

Vk Vl 1 pu

kl X kl xPi
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 Topology estimator

Apply a robust estimation method to estimate the

flows through all the branches.

Apply a statistical test to the estimated flows.

If the flow is significantly different from zero,

then decide that the associated branch is
energized.

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 Parameter estimator
Take advantage of the fact that the state remains
nearly unchanged over a certain period of time,
typically during the late night off-peak period.

Estimate the nodal voltage magnitudes and phase

angles together with the parameters of the lines

Extend the measurement vector by including the

metered values recorded at several several
snapshots.
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 Research Areas
Remote measurement calibration.

Parameter and topology estimators.

Leverage point identification and processing.

Robust estimator with positive breakdown point.

Measurement placement

Dynamic state estimator with phasor measurements.

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