Damping Torque Estimation and Oscillatory Stability Margin Prediction
Damping Torque Estimation and Oscillatory Stability Margin Prediction
Damping Torque Estimation and Oscillatory Stability Margin Prediction
Abstract— The damping torque of linearized models of power axis, as system loading changes, assuming that the critical
systems is studied here as a possible on-line security index, mode is known. When the system is close to HB point, these
based on system identification techniques applied to realistic indices present a fairly linear profile allowing for estimation of
measurements. First, the theoretical values of damping and syn-
chronizing coefficients of the electromagnetic torque are discussed stability/security margins. However, electromechanical modes
in detail. These values are then used to investigate the accuracy of may present a highly nonlinear behavior, making it difficult
damping coefficient identified from on-line measurements using to determine the critical mode, unless the system is very
the ordinary least square (OLS) method. It is demonstrated that “close” to the instability point; in this case, these indices fail
OLS may not be able to correctly estimate the coefficients due to produce accurate estimates of the stability/security margins.
to the nonlinear nature of power system oscillations. Hence,
generalized least square (GLS) and robust fitting with bisquare The authors in [7] and [8] investigate the behavior of
weights (RFBW) are applied to this system identification problem, the damping and synchronizing torque of the system in a
showing to be better alternatives. Based on these results, the single-machine-infinite-bus (SMIB), using the time domain
damping coefficient is proposed and studied as an index to simulation results of the system and utilizing an ordinary
calculate the distance to the closest oscillatory instability point. least square (OLS) method. This is then applied to a multi-
The results obtained from 3 test cases show that the index is
an effective tool, and can be of significant help to operators for machine power system in [9], using classical model of gener-
on-line security monitoring of power systems. ators without modeling exciters and governors. Other system
identification techniques such as Kalman filtering and genetic
Index Terms— Damping torque, system identification, oscilla-
tory stability, stability indices, bifurcations. algorithm have also been utilized to estimate damping and
synchronizing coefficients to achieve less computational time
as well as robustness to noisy measurements [10], [11]. Since
I. I NTRODUCTION the authors in [9] demonstrate that damping torque variations
On-line stability monitoring and system surveillance are are closely related to the trend of electromechanical modes,
considered useful tools in the operation of power systems, as this torque could be in principle used as another index to
these allow operators to guarantee system security by ensuring calculate the stability/security margins. However, the accuracy
that there is enough stability margin even in the case of severe of these estimated values have not been studied.
contingencies. These stability margins are typically associated In this paper, the theoretical values of the damping and
with voltage and/or oscillatory instabilities which have been synchronizing coefficients of the electromechanical torque
the cause for recent major blackouts (e.g. August 2003 North- of linearized models (LM) of power systems are discussed,
East blackout [1], August 1996 WSCC blackout [2]). in order to investigate the accuracy of parameter estimates
Some research has been carried on detection of oscillatory obtained using OLS techniques. The LM used is based on sub-
instability points as well as their prediction and control [3], transient models of generators as well as a full representation
[4], [5], [6]. They may be categorized as off-line and on- of exciters and governors. Alternative methods known as
line methods. Off-line methods are basically system studies generalized least square (GLS) and robust fitting with bisquare
based on certain models and their corresponding differential weights (RFBW) are proposed to handle the cases when OLS
algebraic equations (DAE’s), and hence are highly dependent does not provide accurate estimates. Furthermore, the use of
on modeling assumptions as well as availability of accurate the estimated damping torque coefficient as an index is studied.
system data. On the other hand, on-line methods, if properly The paper is structured as follows: In Section II, the
designed and implemented, can properly capture the actual theoretical background on damping and synchronizing torques
dynamic behavior of the system without the need for modeling is presented, and the procedure to derive the damping and
assumptions from on-line measurements. synchronizing coefficients from an LM is described. The
In [3] and [4], the authors propose indices to predict the identification techniques used to estimate damping coefficient
closest oscillatory instability or Hopf bifurcation (HB) point. from the measured response of the system are explained in
These indices are based on the critical electromechanical Section III. The results of applying the proposed identification
mode of the system that eventually crosses the imaginary methods to calculate the damping coefficient are presented
and discussed in Section IV for a variety of test cases,
This research was partially supported by NSERC, Canada. discussing the behavior of the damping torque coefficient as
2
basically a fitting problem which can be described as: C. Robust Fitting with Bisquare Weights (RFBW)
Y = [Ω ∆] θ + (8) Robust fitting may also be employed as another remedial
method for handling the nonlinear effects, which can occur
= Xθ +
due to large deviations from an operating point. This method
where Y =[Te [1] Te [2] ... Te [N ]]T ∈ N ; is basically an iterative weighted least square (WLS) method,
Ω = ω0 [∆ω[1] ∆ω[2] ... ∆ω[N ] ] ∈ N ; T and is able to give different weights to each residues during
∆ =[∆δ[1] ∆δ[2] ... ∆δ[N ]]T ∈ N ; ∈ N represents the fitting process; data with lower quality are given less
“residuals” introduced to account for fitting errors and weight, since the part of the signal that is distorted due to
measurement noise; θ = [K d , Ks ]T ; and N is the number of the nonlinear effects is hard to fit, and hence should be less
samples. The ordinary least square estimate can be obtained important in the estimation process. One may consider using
as: small perturbations as a way to avoid nonlinearities; however,
θ̂OLS = (X T X)−1 X T Y. (9) in the current application, small disturbances may not be
feasible, since the perturbations have to be large enough to
Here, θ̂OLS is unbiased, efficient (or Markov estimate), and be distinguished from measurement noise.
consistent when is white noise with zero mean [15]. Further- Robust fitting employs the following objective function,
more, it is also identical to the maximum likelihood estimator which assigns weights to different predicted errors:
when is normally distributed. However, the condition of
1
N
whiteness for the current application is not guaranteed, thus θ̂
M in V = ωk 2 [k] (12)
might be biased. This will be clearly shown in a number of N
k=1
case studies in Section IV.
The estimated damping and synchronizing coefficients in this
case are:
B. Generalized Least Square (GLS)
From the system identification point of view, (8) can be θ̂W LS = (X T W X)−1 X T W Y. (13)
represented as follows: where W = diag{ω1 , ω2 , ... , ωN } ∈ N ×N . There are
y[k] = x[k] θ + H(q −1 ) e[k] (10) different weights which can be utilized in the objective func-
tion (12) [17]; in this work, bisquare weights are used. This
−1 −1
where e[k] is white noise; H (q ) is a whitening filter; method has been previously used in economics to decrease the
and q is the backward shifting operator defined by q −1 y[k] = sensitivity of least square to “extreme” values called outliers.
y[k − 1].
Selecting a proper candidate model set in this case, IV. T EST CASES
which includes the true model, is an essential aspect to Several test cases based on 2 simple test systems and
obtain accurate parameter estimates. On the other hand, over- their associated transient stability models, and the Power
parameterization can lead to high computational costs as well System Toolbox (PST) [18] were used to generate the required
as numerical problems (e.g. convergence and local minima). signals, i.e. electrical torque deviations, generator angle and
Therefore, one should search for a model set that includes speed deviations. White Gaussian noise was added to the
the true model with as low number of parameters as possible. mentioned signals as measurement noise, such that the signal-
It is also important to consider that choosing a rather simple to-noise ratio (SNR) would be 40 db. A Monte-Carlo type of
model, i.e. under-parameterization, might lead to inaccurate simulation was used to test the feasibility and accuracy of the
parameter estimates [16]. identified damping coefficient by simulating 20 independent
The candidate model (10) with H(q −1 ) = 1, which leads to cases at each operating condition. Assuming a direction for
(9), is not a general model and may not correctly represent the load change and generation dispatch, the damping coefficients
power system dynamics. For example, when the perturbations using (7) for the electromechanical mode of interest were
are large and hence the linearity assumption does not hold, computed at different operating conditions using the small
the OLS estimates can lead to erroneous results. Experience signal stability analysis functions of PST. These values were
shows that by adding a transfer function such as H(q −1 ) = then compared to the mean value of the results obtained
1/(1 + h1 q −1 + h2 q −2 + ... + hp q −p ) with p = 1 or 2, good from the identification methods OLS, GLS and RFBW based
results can be obtained [15]. This method is also known as on the time domain simulation results for the system. The
generalized least square (GLS) and can be used to correctly damping coefficient behavior with respect to load increase was
model the residuals or filter the nonlinear effects. In this case, studied as a possible index to predict the margin to the closest
θ along with the parameters of the whitening filter have to oscillatory instability.
be estimated using prediction error methods (PEM). These It is important to mention that, in order to achieve highly
methods are basically based on an optimization problem such accurate parameter estimates, a proper time window for the
as: measurement that does not contain nonlinear and saturation
1 2
N
effects should be selected. However, it is not practical to delay
M in V = e [k] (11) the measurements until the oscillations are small enough and
N
k=1 nonlinear effects have completely disappeared, because this
−1 −1
s.t. e[k] = H (q ) {y[k] − x[k] θ} can result in low SNR and consequently erroneous estimates.
4
1 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 3
G1 G1 G3
G2 G4
Fig. 2. Single-Machine-Infinite-Bus (SMIB).
2 4
LM Area 1 Area 2
OLS
0.07 GLS
RFBW Fig. 4. Two-area benchmark system.
0.06
5.5
0.04 : Schedule 1
*
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Imag (rad/s)
0.03 5
o : Schedule 2
0.02
4.5
0.01
4
0
−0.3 −0.2 −0.1 0 0.1 0.2
−0.01 (b): Local mode − Area 1
7.6
−0.02
Imag (rad/s)
100 200 300 400 500 600 700
Loading (MW) 7.4
: Schedule 1
Fig. 3. Damping coefficient Kd for SMIB.
7.2 *o
: Schedule 2
7
In all test cases, in order to excite the system, a three phase
−1.1 −1 −0.9 −0.8 −0.7 −0.6 −0.5
fault was applied and quickly removed. A sampling time of (c): Local mode − Area 2
0.1 sec was used so that the measured signals contain at least
three oscillations periods. Choosing a longer window did not 8.6 * : Schedule 1
o : Schedule 2
Imag (rad/s)
A. Single-Machine-Infinite-Bus (SMIB) Fig. 5. Eigenvalue profiles for different dispatch scenarios; Schedules 1 and
2.
The generator in the simple test system depicted in Fig.
2 was modeled using sub-transient model. There is an elec- 1
Schedule 1
tromechanical mode which moves toward the right half plane Schedule 2
HB
(RHP) as the load increases from 100 MW to 700 MW, 0.99
G G G
G 2 1 2
1
0.04 0.04 LM:Inter−area mode 0.08
LM: Inter−area mode 0.08
LM:Local mode Area−2
OLS OLS
0.03 GLS 0.03 0.06 0.06
GLS
RFBW
K (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
RFBW
0.04 0.04
0.02 0.02
0.02
0.01 0.01 0.02
d
0
0 0 0
−0.02
−0.02
−0.01 −0.01
2000 2500 3000 3500 2000 2500 3000 3500 2400 2600 2800 3000 3200 3400 2400 2600 2800 3000 3200 3400
Loading (MW) Loading (MW) Loading (MW)
Loading (MW)
G G G G
3 4 3 4
0.02 0.05 0.08
0.015 0.04
0.04 0.06
0.03
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
Kd (p.u./rad/s)
0.01 0.04
0.02 0.02
0.005
0.02
0.01
0 0
0 0
−0.005 −0.01 −0.02 −0.02
−0.01 −0.02
2000 2500 3000 3500 2000 2500 3000 3500 2400 2600 2800 3000 3200 3400 2400 2600 2800 3000 3200 3400
Loading (MW) Loading (MW) Loading (MW) Loading (MW)
Fig. 7. Damping coefficients of all generators for the 2-area benchmark Fig. 8. Damping coefficients of all generators for the 2-area benchmark
system for Schedule 1. system for Schedule 2.
expect to have different eigenvalue profiles. For instance, in results in terms of accuracy in estimation as well as prediction.
this system, two dispatch scenarios, Schedules 1 and 2, result The RFBW’s accuracy is between the OLS and GLS, and from
in fairly different eigenvalue profiles, as depicted in Fig. 5. computational point of view, it is slower than OLS and faster
There is an HB point before the nose point, as shown in the than the GLS.
corresponding PV curves depicted in Fig. 6. The advantage of using K d , when compared to eigen-
1) Schedule 1: This dispatch results in the inter-area mode value based indices, is that, in order to monitor system
becoming unstable as loading increases. In this case, gener- stability/security margin, the damping coefficient is able to
ators G2 and G3 are dispatched proportionally to their base provide accurate margins without the need for monitoring
power as the loads at Bus 7 and 9 increase. Loads are modeled particular modes. This can be an issue for eigenvalue-based
as constant PQ loads and are increased with a constant power indices. For instance, the damping torque is able to capture
factor. The inter-area mode becomes unstable at a loading level the oscillatory phenomenon for both schedules; on the other
of about 3050 MW. This can also be observed clearly in Fig. hand, for Schedule 2, if only the inter-area mode were used
7, which depicts the theoretical and estimated values of K d as an index, it would yield inaccurate margins.
for this case study. Observe that all the calculated K d ’s tend
to zero as the load increases; however, the GLS method offers V. C ONCLUSION
superior performance in terms of predicting the HB point, The procedure to derive the theoretical values of damping
since the estimates are fairly close to the theoretical values. and synchronizing coefficients obtained using linearized mod-
2) Schedule 2: Schedule 2 is an interesting dispatch sce- els of power system was demonstrated. The accuracy of the
nario where the inter-area mode is primarily the critical one estimates based on system identification and measured time
until at certain loading level (3030 MW), the local mode domain response of the system was investigated by comparing
in Area 2 becomes critical, crossing the imaginary axis and them to theoretical values.
hence leading the system to oscillatory instability conditions The GLS and RFBW identification methods are better alter-
at a loading level of about 3150 MW. In this case, the loads natives to the OLS method. In particular, it is shown that OLS
are increased as in Schedule 1; however, only Generator G 3 may not be able to accurately estimate the coefficients due to
is dispatched to respond to the load change. This certainly the nonlinear effects that appear in the measured response of
stresses G3 more, and thus the local mode in Area 2 becomes a power system, especially when the system is well-damped.
critical, as shown in Fig. 5. These effects can be reduced using smaller perturbations.
For this scenario, it is possible to compute two values of However, there is a trade off between the magnitude of the
Kd using (7) which are associated with the inter-area mode perturbation and SNR of the measured signals, i.e. the lower
and the local mode in Area 2, as depicted in Fig. 8. Since both the SNR, the less accurate the estimates.
inter-area and local mode in Area 2 are dominant modes, time The damping coefficient is shown to be a useful index
domain simulation results, in this case, would be influenced to predict the distance to instability points when system
by both of them, and so would be the identified K d ’s. Notice load changes. It is basically a close duplicate of the elec-
that in this case, the values obtained for K d from OLS are tromechanical modes’ behavior; however, it does not require
not accurate. Neither are the predicted stability margins. On the monitoring of certain modes which can be an issue in
the other hand, the K d ’s obtained using GLS present the best large systems. Hence, this index may help system operators
6
to determine proximity to an oscillatory instability, without Hassan Ghasemi (S’01) received his B.Sc. and M.Sc. degree from the
requiring modeling assumptions and simulations and thus University of Tehran, Iran, in 1999 and 2001, respectively. He did research
on analysis and design of machine drives during his master program. He also
allowing to take proper action in the case of contingencies worked in Jovain Electrical Machines Co. (JEMCO) 2000-2001 as a part-
and/for congestion problems. time electrical engineer. He has been in the Ph.D. program at the Electrical
and Computer Engineering Department, University of Waterloo, Canada, since
2002 working in the field of power system modeling and application of system
ACKNOWLEDGMENT identification to stability analysis of power systems.
The authors would like to express their gratitude to Pow-
ertech Labs Inc. personnel and Hamidreza Zareipour from
University of Waterloo for their valuable help, comments and
discussions.
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