Engineering and management of communication networks in powergrid’s full digital substations

Power Grid Corporation of India Limited (POWERGRID), the Central Transmission Utility (CTU) of India, has focused on the digitization and automation of its substations during the past decade. During this period, the company has deployed IEC 61850 based substation automation in more than 100 EHV & UHV grid substations located all over the country. This paper discusses about the importance of communication network architecture and its engineering in implementation of control & protection schemes involving IEC 61850 GOOSE & Sampled Values (SV) in a full digital substation environment. The paper talks about the commercial full Digital Substations, the Protection Automation & Control system of which has already been tested rigorously during the Factory Acceptance Test (FAT) and are presently under commissioning.