IEC 61850 Data & Service

Model and SCL

Alidu Abubakari
Researcher, KEPCO Research Institute (KEPRI)
Power Transmission Lab
 Introduction
 Electric power networks are responsible for the transport of energy from
generation sites to end consumers
 The nodes in such networks are called substations and take over the
voltage transformation and also energy routing.

 Substations are controlled by the

Substation Automation system (SAS)
which is composed of
 all the electronic equipment that
continuously
 monitor,
 control and
 protect
the high voltage equipment so as to avoids
unplanned network outages
 Intelligent Electronic Device
 Microprocessor–based controllers of power
system equipment– e.g. circuit breaker,
protective relay…

 Receive digitalized data from sensors and

power
equipment

 Issue control commands in case of anomalies

to
 History of IEC 61850

DNP 3.0

IEC 60870-5

DNP 3.0
ModBus

ModBus
History of IEC 61850
UCA: Utility Communication
Architecture
• Protocols
• Data models
• Abstract service
definitions

IEC 60870-5
• A communication profile for sending basic
telecontrol
messages between two systems
• Based on permanent directly connected data
circuits
 Why Standards Are Needed ?
 Interoperability and Integration
– No standard for data representation or how
devices should look and behave to network
applications
 Intuitive device and data modeling and naming
naming
– Hierarchical and structured, rather than plain
plain formatted
 Fast and convenient communication
 Lower cost for installation, configuration and Interoperability Concept
configuration and maintenance
 IEC 61850 Substation Architecture

 Substation bus is realized as a medium bandwidth Ethernet network, which carries all
ACSI requests/responses and generic substation events messages(GSE, including GOOSE
and GSSE).
 Process bus connects the IEDs to the traditional dumb devices (merge units, etc.) and
 Core Components of IEC 61850
 An object model describing the information available from the
different primary equipment and from the substation
automation functions
– Abstract definitions of services, data and Common Data
Class, independent of underlying protocols
 A specification of the communication between the IEDs
of the substation automation system.
– Maps the services to actual protocols
 A configuration language
– Exchange configuration information
 Primary Parts
IEC 61850 Standards
 Part 6-1: Substation
Basic principles Part 1
Configuration Language (SCL)
Glossary Part 2  Part 7-2: Abstract
Communications Service Interface
Part 3
General Requirements
(ACSI) and
System and project management Part 4 base types
Communication requirements Part 5  Part 7-3: Common Data Classes
Substation Automation System Configuration Part 6 (CDC)
Basic Communication Structure Part 7  Part 7-4: Logical Nodes
Mapping to Sampled Measured Values  Part 8-1: Specific
Part 8 MMS and
Mapping to Ethernet
Part 9
Communications Service Mappings
Ethernet
(SCSM) -
Conformance testing Part 10 MMS & Ethernet
 Part 9-2: SCSM - Sampled Values
over Ethernet
 Benefits of IEC 61850 Power Substation
Protocol Integration/ Standardized naming
Interoperability conventions

Higher performance
messaging support system evolution
IEC 61850
for
inter-relay communications

self-describing devices & Free architecture

automatic object /free allocation of
discovery function
IEC 61850 Modeling Approach
Obviously, when developing such a
system it is necessary to create a
model of a general substation with all
of its components and functions.
Then it is necessary to stipulate the
exact form of communication that is
allowed and supported by the system.
This describes exactly the challenges
addressed by the IEC61850 standard
This data model consists of a number
of logical nodes, which are the key
objects in the model of the IEC61850
standard.
A logical node can have a number of
data objects attached to it, and each
IEC 61850 Class Model
 Anatomy of an IEC 61850-8-1 Object Name
• For instance, suppose that you have a logical device named “Relay1”
consisting of a single circuit breaker logical node XCBR for which you want
to determine if the breaker is in the remote or local mode of operation. To
determine this you would read the object shown in Figure below.
 Data Example of Logical Node
LN : A named grouping of data and associated services that is logically
related to some power system function.

Common Data Class: Double

Points Control
 Logical Nodes Information Categories
 Common logical node information
– Information independent from the dedicated function represented by the LN, e.g., mode, health, name plate,
name plate, ...
 Status information
– Information representing either the status of the process or of the function allocated to the LN, e.g., switch
switch type, switch operating capability
 Settings
– Information needed for the function of a logical node, e.g., first, second, and third reclose time
 Measured values
– Analogue data measured from the process or calculated in the functions like currents, voltages, power, etc.,
power, etc., e.g., total active
– power, total reactive power, frequency
 Controls
– Data, which are changed by commands like switchgear state (ON/OFF), resettable counters, e.g., position,
position, block opening
 88 pre-defined logical nodes and extensible
 Common Data Classes (CDC)
• Defines structure for common types that are used to describe
DATA
objects.
• CDC are complex objects built on predefined simple base types
organized into functional constraints (FC)
• Examples:
• Single point status (SPS) – on/off
• Double point status (DPS) – on/off/transient
• Double point controllable (DPC) – state can be changed via controls
 Functional Constraints
• There are many data attributes in an object like a breaker that have
related use:
Control, configuration, measurement, reporting, etc.

• Functional Constraints (FC) is a property of a data attribute that

characterizes the specific use of the attribute.

• Useful to functionally organize data attributes to provide structure

and context.
Logical Node Class Example -XCBR
Logical Node Class Example -XCBR

Attribute Type Functional Range Mandatory/

Name Constraint Optional
 IEC 61850 Communication Scope
1. Protection-data exchange
between bay and station level
2. Protection-data exchange
between bay level and remote
protection
3. Data exchange within bay level
4. CT and VT instantaneous data
exchange between process and
bay levels
5. Control-data exchange between
process and bay level
 IEC 61850 Communication Scope
6. Control-data exchange between bay
and station level
7. Data exchange between substation
and remote engineer’s workplace
8. Direct data exchange between the
bays especially for fast functions like
interlocking
9. Data exchange within station level
10. Control-data exchange between
substation (devices) and a remote
control center
 ACSI: Abstract Communications Service
Interface
None timing critical message transmitting

Used for configuration, maintenance, log…

Three basic components

A set of objects

A set of services to manipulate and access those objects

A base set of data types for describing objects

 Basic Information Models
 SERVER
 Represents the external visible behavior of a (physical)
(physical) device
 Communicate with a client
 Send information to peer devices
 LOGICAL-DEVICE (LD)
 Contains the information produced and consumed by a
by a group of domain-specific application functions,
functions, which are defined as LOGICAL-NODEs
 LOGICAL-NODE (LN)
 Contains the information produced and consumed by a
by a domain specific application function
 DATA
 Status and meta-information of object it presents in
in substation
 Provide means to specify typed information
 Basic Information Models
 DATA-SET
 The grouping of data and data attributes
 A view of DATA
 SETTING-GROUP
 How to switch from one set of setting values to
another one
 How to edit setting groups
 REPORT and LOG
 Describe the conditions for generating reports and
logs based on parameters set by the client
 Reports may be sent immediately or deferred
 Logs can be queried for later retrieval
 Generic Substation Event (GSE) control block
(GSSE/GOOSE)
 Supports a fast and reliable system-wide
distribution of input and output data values
 Sampled Values Transmission control block
 Fast and cyclic transfer of samples
 Basic Information Models
 Control
 Provide client mechanisms to control the DATA related
related to external devices, control outputs, or other
other internal functions
 Substitution
 Support replacement of a process value (measurement
(measurement of analogue values or status values) by
by another value
 Get/Set
 Retrieve or write particular Data Attribute Values
 Dir/Definition
 Retrieve Object References and definitions of all sub-
sub-objects.
 Basic Information Models
 Association
 How the communication between the various
types of devices is achieved
 Two-party and Multicast
 Access Control
 Time Synchronization
 Provide the UTC synchronized time to devices
and system
 File Transfer
 Defines the exchange of large data blocks such as
such as programs
The communication profiles
 Communication concepts
Peer to peer communication; Physical Device Physical Device
time critical ACSI Client ACSI Server
Data
Client / Server communication reports
Data
Data
req / rsp

Application
Applications of "peer-to-peer" communication Physical Device
 tripping of circuit breakers: short ACSI Server
information that needs to be transmitted Data
GOOSE Message
with a low probability of loss within a few Sampled Values
Data

milliseconds Data
multicast
 transmission of sampled values from
instrumental transformers: high amount of Application
Application
data, to be transmitted within a few
milliseconds, loss of data needs to be Physical Device
detected
 Principle of TPAA and MCAA
 Two-Party-Application-Association (TPAA)
 A bi-directional connection-oriented information
information exchange Reliable and end-to-end
end flow control

 Multicast-Application-Association (MCAA)
 A unidirectional information exchange
 Between one source (publisher) and one or many
destinations (subscriber)
 The subscriber shall be able to detect loss and duplication
of information received
 The receiver shall notify the loss of information to its user
and shall discard duplicated information
 Service model

• Services provided by ACSI include querying object set,

getting/setting data values, controlling system objects, report

manipulation, log manipulation, and other services like file

upload/download.

• In order to request a service in a server, an application must first

establish a valid two-party application association (TPAA)

• A typical interaction procedure between an application A and a
server S goes as follows:

1. A establishes a TCP connection with S;

2. A “logs in” to S by requesting the Associate service from S,

providing authentication related information as parameters;

3. S validates the information provided by A and creates a TPAA

object, which provides a virtual view of S to A;
 4. A requests subsequent services while S processes the requests

and responses with appropriate responses defined in the IEC 61850

standard;

5. A issues a Release request to S;

6. S reclaims the TPAA of A and ends the session.

Reporting and
Logging
GOOSE: Generic Object Oriented Substation
Event
 Used for fast transmission of substation events, such as commands,
alarms, indications, as messages

 A single GOOSE message sent by an IED can be received several

receivers

 Take advantage of Ethernet and supports real-time behavior

 Examples:
Tripping of switchgear

Providing position status of interlocking

 Mapping To Real Communication
Systems
IEC 61850 is just a high level description of substation automation
Use MMS to implement IEC61850
Map each IEC 61850 object to a MMS object
Map each IEC 61850 service to a MMS operation
All but GOOSE messages and transmission of sampled values
are mapped to MMS protocol stack
 ACSI Object and Service Mapping
ACSI Objects Mapping ACSI Service Mapping
 Sampled Measured Values
 A method for transmitting sampled
measurements from transducers such as
CTs, VTs, and digital I/O.

 Enables sharing of I/O signals among

IEDs

 Supports 2 transmission methods:

Multicast service (MSVC) over Ethernet

Unicast (point-to-point) service (USVC)

over serial links
SCL: Substation Configuration
Language
 Purpose: interoperable exchange of communication system
configuration data between an IED configuration tool and a
configuration tool from different manufacturers.

 A formal description of
– Relations between substation automation system and the
switchyard
– Relations of the switchyard structure to the SAS functions (logical
nodes) configured on the IEDs
 Four different file types
 System Specification Description (.ssd)
Allows users to describe the substation design and associated functional
description

Describe the single line diagram of the substation

 Substation Configuration Description (.scd)

Configuration of the system

Contains the substation description section, communication configuration

and the IEDs

IEDs in the SCD are no more in their default configuration and they
configured to operate with the SAS.
 IED Capability Description (.icd)
Default functionality of an IED in substation
Describes the capabilities of an IED
Before configuration, the IED name in this file is TEMPLATE
Contains different logical node Types

Configured IED Description (.cid)

Contains substation specific names, values and address instead of the
the default one in the ICD
Information Flow in the Configuration Process
• First Step is to define function
specification via substation one-
line-diagram
• This enters into a system
specification tool which provides
SSD files as output
• System designers selects an
appropriate IEC 61850 compliant
IED
• The ICD file of the IED and the SSD
became input to the system
configurator
• The output of the system
configurator is the SCD file
 The SCL Section

• Header --> identifies the configuration

• Substation --> identifies connections
electrical function
• Communication --> identifies the
and subnets
• IED --> identifies device functions and
setting
• Data Types Templates --> to
other sections
 Conclusion

 Due to its complexity and the assumed domain-specific knowledge,

the IEC 61850 standard is difficult for people to understand and

implement.

 Although the IEC 61850 adopts an object-oriented approach,

implementers still need their own internal data representation or

take the advantage of a database system.