IEC 61850: from engineering to traceable testing.

With 11,000 kilometres of extra-high-voltage lines at 220 to 380 kV, Amprion operates one of Germany’s longest transmission networks. Its 165 switching and transformer substations distribute electricity into regional and local networks, connecting generators and consumers from Lower Saxony to the Alps, in an area producing around one third of Germany’s economic output.

“ When, in 2010, the “Amprion SCT NBF-NG” project began to implement IEC 61850 and top-down engineering for our new protection and control systems, Amprion was looking for a company to advise us and help implement our software requirements. The requirement was to generate a fully device-independent SCL file.

Because H&S has a very high level of IEC 61850 expertise and we had already worked together on several secondary and primary system projects, Amprion decided to implement this project jointly.

Before “SCT NBF-NG”, there were no machine-readable specifications for implementing substation control; preparation was left to the control system supplier. An engineering tool with an attached database, including role-based access, was intended to improve these processes. The objective was to define requirements, specify substation control and achieve interoperability and interchangeability of secondary components across manufacturers.

Through committee work and collaboration with H&S, we developed an Amprion IEC 61850 data-model profile to be implemented by the engineering tool. Role-based access separates specification of typical designs from installation design. Many communication processes are defined jointly and then automated to maintain the NBF-NG installation standard.

The innovative technical exchange between Amprion and H&S has produced an established engineering tool. Development, improvements and problem solving continue to meet our requirements for the engineering tool.”

With its two TSOs, Elia in Belgium and 50Hertz in Germany, the Elia Group is among Europe’s five leading transmission system operators. Elia and 50Hertz operate nearly 18,990 km of high-voltage grid in Belgium and north-eastern Germany, supplying almost 30 million end users, including large industrial consumers and households.

Elia operates a transmission grid in Belgium at 30 to 400 kV. In Germany, 50Hertz transmits electricity at 150, 220 and 380 kV.

“To address the engineering requirements introduced by integrating IEC 61850 into our secondary systems, we were looking for design software that met all our requirements. We met the H&S development team at a trade fair. At an IEC 61850 exhibition, they impressed us with a tailored engineering tool.

We launched a joint project with H&S to develop an engineering process allowing independent configuration of substation gateways (RTU/DCS) and testing of bay protection units. It needed to offer maximum flexibility while hiding the complexity of IEC 61850 from our designers.

The Elia SCD Generator developed in this project lets us process signal lists created by our basic engineering department, validate them against IEC 61850 and obtain a fully configured, standards-compliant SCD file for the project. It contains all installation IED data models generated from our signal lists, client configuration for RTUs (gateways) and IEC 60870-5-104 information required for transmission to the network control centre. During the project, H&S impressed us with excellent collaboration and precise implementation of our requirements. Their flexibility allowed us to respond to new requirements, develop solutions together and integrate them smoothly into our existing engineering process. The team demonstrated expertise in preliminary discussions and built our confidence through regular in-person meetings. I expect some of the solutions and ideas developed to influence the market, including client configuration using generated, manufacturer-independent IED models. The technically demanding comparison of IED data models and a comparison-based update function were also implemented in a highly intuitive solution. We can confidently recommend working with H&S: the combination of flexibility, personal contact with open communication, an agile development environment and a reasonable cost structure, including for subsequent requirements, was ideal.”