Application of Modern Techniques for Detecting

Subsynchronous Oscillations in Power Systems

Yu Xia, Member IEEE
Brian K. Johnson, Senior Member IEEE
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Idaho
Moscow, Idaho USA
Yu_Xia@selinc.com, b.k.johnson@ieee.org
AbstractDetecting Subsynchronous Resonance (SSR) in power
systems in a secure, dependable and fast manner is a major
challenge for steam turbine generator and doubly fed induction
generator protection. Researchers have been applying Artificial
Intelligence schemes to solve generally complex, nonlinear or
pattern recognition problems. This paper describes an
amalgamated scheme which combines Artificial Neural
Networks (ANN) and Wavelet Transforms (WT) to provide
accurate and comprehensive SSR detection in power systems. A
test system based on the IEEE second benchmark model for SSR
is built and modified to generate both stable and growing SSR
conditions. An approach combining WT and ANN for SSR
detection is presented in a detailed manner. Characteristics
from generator electrical and mechanical signals readily
available to generator protection systems are extracted and
different combinations of these characteristics are used to build
the detection scheme. The developed SSR detection scheme has
been tested with signals generated from an electromagnetic
transients simulation, demonstrating desirable security,
dependability and speed for SSR detection.
Index Termssubsynchronous resonance, recurrent neural
network, wavelet transform, protective relaying.

I.

INTRODUCTION

Series capacitors provide an effective and economical

way to increase power transfer capabilities of longer power
transmission lines. However, when there is a disturbance on a
series capacitor compensated power system, transients in the
subsynchronous frequency range can be excited in the
electrical system which in turn can excite natural mechanical
resonant modes in the rotor. To currents in this frequency
range, it will look like the rotor is spinning faster than the
electromagnetic field produced by the armature currents, and
the effective rotor resistance to subsynchronous currents is
negative as viewed from the stator terminals. When this
negative resistance is larger than the sum of the stator
resistance and network resistance, excessive voltages and
currents in subsynchronous frequency range can be produced.
This phenomenon is referred to as the Induction Generator
Effect (IGE). There are other forms of subsynchronous

978-1-4799-1303-9/13/$31.00 2013 IEEE

Henian Xia
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, Tennessee, USA
Normann Fischer, Senior Member IEEE
Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories, Inc.
Pullman, Washington USA
resonance (SSR). The most commonly studied types are
Subsynchronous Torque Interaction (SSTI), Subsynchronous
Torsional Amplification and Subsynchronous Control
Interaction (SSCI).
Several SSR detection schemes have been developed,
with the most significant activity occurring during the 1970s
and 1980s. Examples include the TEX relay, the torsional
motion relay and the armature current relay. However, these
detection schemes are a compromise of performance and cost
[1]. Performance of these relays, with regard to speed,
accuracy and reliability, still has room for improvement. With
the powerful mathematical capability of modern
microprocessor relays, more complex and advanced detection
schemes can be developed to perform SSR detection. The
proposed algorithm combines Wavelet Transform (WT),
which is used to extract the critical time frequency
relationship, with an Artificial Neural Network (ANN), which
is ideal to solve complex nonlinear problems.
Section II and III will provide a review of neural networks
and wavelet transforms. Section IV will describe the study
system used to test the detection scheme. The detection
scheme is described in Section V. The tuning of detection
parameters and performance results are presented in Section
VI, followed by conclusions in Section VII.
II.

NEURAL NETWORK METHODS

Neural networks are one of the more commonly applied,

artificial intelligence techniques. Learning from gathered
experience, ANNs perform similar actions to human
reasoning learned through experience. This experience is
focused by training the ANN with user defined training sets.
Advantages of ANN methodology over conventional pattern
detection schemes include faster computation, learning
ability, multi-dimensional mapping, robustness and noise
rejection [2] [3]. ANN techniques are mainly used for solving
complex, nonlinear problems that are difficult to describe and
model in an accurate fashion. A power system is a highly
nonlinear system that changes with time. Conventional
detection schemes, which are based on linearized models of

the system, may not guarantee suitable performance for all

practical operating conditions.
There are several different types of ANNs that have been
developed and implemented. To achieve the best performance
in response of the dynamic changing nature of power systems,
the Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) appears to be a better
choice for this application. The RNN is different from the
conventional feedforward neural network in that the past
states will be encoded into the model. Each time the current
state is input to the neural network, prior states, which can be
considered as memories, are inputs too, as shown in Figure
1.

domain; Flexible time and frequency resolution (constant

Q analysis).

By definition, continuous wavelet transform is a

convolution of the continuous signal x(t) and the predefined
mother wavelet function g(t), as shown in equation (1):



Where a and b are the continuous coefficients of the scale

and translation respectively. The mother wavelet used in this
paper is called B-Spline, as defined in (2):




Where, M = 2, Fb = 0.5 and Fc = 1.



Figure 2 shows the results applying the CWT to analyze

generator speed variations for a subsynchronous oscillation.
The figure clearly reflects how the oscillation magnitude
changes with time.

Figure 1: Architecture of a focused time delay neural network [3]

III.

WAVELET TRANFORMS

In order to achieve correct performance from the RNN, it

is crucial to extract the most critical characteristics that
represent the essence of the problem when creating the
training set, as well as in the final application. As explained
in Section I, when SSR is excited in a generator, a growing
oscillation in subsynchronous frequency range will be
encountered. Therefore, the relationship between the
magnitude of the generator unstable mode and time is a
critical characteristic that can reveal the problem clearly.
Traditionally, protective schemes use the Discrete Fourier
Transform (DFT) to analyze the magnitude of a given
frequency. However, the DFT has a time averaging effect
over the whole window and cannot be used to describe the
exact relationship between magnitude and time. Other tools
capable of describing this relationship include the Short Time
Fourier Transform (STFT) and Wavelet Transform (WT).
Each can be used to decompose signals in both time and
frequency domain [4]. The properties of each are briefly
compared in Table I.
Because of the constant Q property [5], the WT can
automatically adjust its frequency resolution, which is an
advantage for SSR analysis.
TABLE I. Comparison of signal processing analysis tools
DFT
Decomposes signal only in the frequency domain; The
analyzed signal frequency has to be integer multiples of
resolution frequency.
STFT Decomposes signal in both the time and frequency
domain; Fixed time and frequency resolution; not good for
signal with a wide frequency range.
WT
Decomposes signal in both the time and frequency

Figure 2: 3D graph of CWT of subsynchronous speed variations

Observation of the results in Fig. 2 shows that the wavelet

transform coefficients change at a nearly constant slope after
the transient period for both growing and damped
oscillations. The oscillation growing rate (OGR) is therefore
defined to characterize the rate of growth, and is shown in
equation (3):



Where WT_Coefficient(t) is the calculated wavelet

transform coefficient at time t of the signal window. T is the
signal window length for the wavelet transform.

IV.

POWER SYSTEM MODEL

A study system based on the IEEE second benchmark

model on SSR is built in a real time digital simulation
environment, with the network configuration shown in Figure
3 [6].

The model consists of three parts.

1. The synchronous machine electrical model is
implemented with two damper windings on the q-axis
and one damper winding and one field winding on the
d-axis.
2. The mechanical shaft system is modeled by Hookes
law of elasticity and Newtons law of motion. The
shaft system consists of an exciter, generator rotor,
low pressure turbine and high pressure turbine
connected together by shafts of finite stiffness.
3. In the transmission network, the synchronous
generator under study is connected to an infinite bus
by two parallel lines. One of the lines is 55% series
compensated.

benchmark model. In the second battery of simulations, the

damping coefficients are increased intentionally to simulate
damped subsynchronous oscillations. In total, 480 fault
events were generated, where 240 of the events produce
growing oscillations and another 240 produce oscillations that
damp out.
TABLE III. Parameters varied in the simulated fault scenarios
Fault Duration
Fault Resistance Fault inception
(cycles)
(ohm)
Angle (deg)
0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 0.01, 0.1, 0.5, 1.0
0, 30, 60, 90, 120,
2.5
150, 180, 210, 240,
270, 300, 330

V.

COMBINED NEURAL NETWORK AND WT BASED SSR

DETECTION SCHEME

A flowchart for the proposed SSR detection scheme based

on RNN and WT is shown in Figure 4. Since the SSR can be
excited by power system disturbances which can be classified
as steady-state and transient types [7], disturbance detection
logic is implemented as the arming logic for the NN based
SSR detector, as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 3: IEEE second benchmark model on SSR

The electrical data, the shaft parameters and the calculated

modal shapes of the generator are described in detail in [6].
The generator modal frequencies are shown in Table II,
where is the calculated damping factor of each mode.
Based on eigenvalue analysis of the simulated power
system, mode 1 is the unstable mode that is excited by
interaction with the series capacitor [1].
Mode
1
2
3

TABLE II: Generator modal quantities [6]

fn
Hn

24.65 Hz
0.05 rad/sec
1.55 pu
32.39 Hz
0.05 rad/sec
9.39 pu
51.10 Hz
0.05 rad/sec
74.80 pu

Table III lists the power system disturbances conditions

that were simulated. In the first battery of simulations, the
mechanical damping coefficients are the same as in the

Figure 4: Neural Network and WT based SSR detection

algorithm

The low pass filter shown in the figure is used to remove

high frequency components prior to input to the finite
impulse response (FIR) filter [8] used in the transient part of
the disturbance detector and to the steady-state disturbance
detector. The low pass filter is implemented as a Butterworth
filter and the transfer function of the low pass filter is given
by equation (4). The higher the sampling rate is, the more
accurate and faster the relay is. However, because of the
limited arithmetic processing capabilities of protective relays,
the sampled data are down sampled based on the power
system frequency. In this model, they are down sampled to 16

* 60 Hz using linear interpolation.



Each of the 4 characteristics represents aspects that can be

used to characterize the behavior of SSR. Some of them are
very pertinent to this phenomenon and some of them do not
reveal much information.
Figure 6 shows the RNN architecture which is trained
with the Matlab Neural Network Toolbox. It has one hidden
layer and one output layer. For the hidden layer, with a row
vector size of six, the transfer function is a linear function.
The output layer has only one neuron and the transfer
function is a sigmoid function, which is usually used for
pattern recognition problems, as a result the outputs of the
neuron are squashed into the range of 0 to 1 [3]. If the output
is rounded to 1, then growing subsynchronous oscillation is
detected. If the output is rounded to 0, it indicates the
oscillation is damped. The Levenberg-Marquardt back
propagation network training function is used to update
weight and bias values according to the Levenberg-Marquardt
optimization technique. The neural network is set to
adaptively learn to adjust to changes in the dynamical power
system. Each time an instance is input to the RNN, the
coefficients are updated to minimize the cost function.

Figure 5: Power System Disturbance Detector Block from Figure 4.

The steady-state disturbance detector, which is the right

side of Fig. 5, evaluates the difference between the present
RMS value of the armature current and the value of the RMS
armature current from ten cycles earlier. If the difference
between the two RMS values is larger than a threshold, which
is set to be 0.1 times nominal current, then a steady-state
disturbance is detected.
A distance relay is implemented as the power system
transient disturbance detector. The FIR filter is implemented
as a full cycle cosine filter with the coefficients shown in
equation (5). Once the current and voltage signals are
conditioned by the FIR filter, the magnitude and angle of the
signals can be computed to calculate the effective impedance
seen by the relay [9].



If a transient or steady state system disturbance is detected,

the signals will be fed to the SSR detection algorithm, which
makes the decision whether the disturbance has excited SSR.
In this paper, the four measured characteristics shown in
Table IV are extracted and used for the SSR analysis. As part
of the generator speed conditioning process, system mode
speed is subtracted to extract only the oscillation information.
1
2
3
4

TABLE IV. Extracted characteristics

RMS magnitude of current of each phase
DFT magnitude of current of each phase at 30Hz
DFT magnitude of current of each phase at 60Hz
Oscillation growing rate at mode 1 frequency of generator
speed

Figure 6: Neural network architecture

VI.

PARAMETER TUNING, ALGORITHM PERFORMANCE

AND DISCUSSION

The power system disturbance detector was tested with

multiple disturbances and achieved a high rate of accuracy.
As an example, Figure 7 shows currents and voltages input to
the power system disturbance detector for a three phase fault
at the end of the series compensated line. The fault is cleared
after 0.02 sec. Figure 8 shows the power system disturbance
detector response for the fault. The first trace shows that the
distance element picks up, triggering the transient detector
(second trace). The steady-state detector also picks up in the
third trace. A signal window of 16 power system cycles is
used to strike a balance between speed and accuracy.
Once the disturbance detector identifies a disturbance that
could potentially lead to SSR, the measured and processed
data is sent to the SSR detection algorithm to determine if the
subsynchronous oscillation is growing or declining. The
characteristics from Table IV were used to define potential
signals for training sets and then test their performance using
simulation results from 240 transients events produced with
the SSR second benchmark model from Figure 3. The
purpose of the testing was to determine which characteristics
or combinations of characteristics are most effective at
detection. The computation burden is also a concern.

34
123
124
134
234
1234

Current, A

4000
2000
0
-2000
-4000
0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.6

0.7

0.8

Time, s

Voltage, kV

500

-500
0.3

0.4

0.5
Time, s

Figure 7: Voltages and currents measured by the relay

Distance Calculation

100
50
0
0.3

0.4

0.5
0.6
Distance Relay Output

0.7

0.8

0
0.3

0.4

0.5
0.6
Current Comparator Ouput

0.7

0.8

0.4

0.5
0.6
Disturbance Detector Output

0.7

0.8

0.7

0.8

1
0.5
0
0.3
1
0.5
0
0.3

The results in the table show significant differences

between the performance using different combinations of
characteristics for detecting SSR. As one would expect,
oscillation growing rate is the clearest and most direct
indication of SSR. As indicated by low detection rates, the
RMS phase current, magnitudes at 30Hz and 60Hz do not
provide reliable SSR detection when used alone. A
combination of all these three signatures performs slightly
better. Combining more characteristics generally provides
more information and a better result. However, a poor
combination may result in a lower detection rate. As shown
by Table V, a combination of all of the four characteristics,
provide the best detection performance. But using
characteristics 2 and 4 is almost as good, with lower
processing requirements.
VII.

0.5

0.4

0.5

0.6

Figure 8: Power system disturbance detector response

Table V shows how detection rate, as defined in equation

(6), changes with different possible combinations of
characteristics from Table IV.
 
 


True Positive: Growing oscillation detected as positive;
True Negative: Damped oscillation detected as negative;
False Positive: Damped oscillation detected as positive;
False Negative: Growing oscillation detected as negative;
Total Events: Summation of the above four scenarios.
TABLE V: Detection rate vs. characteristics combination
Characteristics
Detection rate (%)
1
50.0
2
50.2
3
50.6
4
83.4
12
49.8
13
50.2
14
89.8
23
50.4
24
96.8

89.0
52.4
97.2
94.2
97.4
97.6

CONCLUSION

Traditional SSR detection schemes have their limits in

accuracy, reliability and speed. An amalgamated scheme
based on wavelet transform and artificial neural network was
proposed and implemented. The IEEE second benchmark
model for SSR study was built and simulation results were
generated to train and test the new algorithm. Four
characteristics, based on measured electrical and mechanical
signals, were extracted and the detection performance of
these signals alone or in combinations was evaluated. Using
the four chosen characteristics, the algorithm was proved to
be effective and detection rate of the algorithm is 97.6% and
96.8% with the two of them. This new scheme is shown to be
fast, dependable and secure for SSR detection, which proves
it to be a practical scheme.
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