Hitachi Energy New Generation Digital Substation stakeholders

Managing Grid Assets in the Digital Substation

So how can you control the grid in a way that improves reliability and keeps the cost of power low? With limited capital budgets, the

utilities must make choices related to long-term expenditures.

These choices include

 Considering all relevant factors, determining which projects minimize risk

 Determining which aging equipment assets can more cost-effectively reduce risk

 determining whether additional capital expenditures can be justified to regulators or other stakeholders.

Regulators or other stakeholders

 Determine the most efficient way to deploy resources during an outage

Process bus digital communication standards support interoperability between IEDs from different vendors and “digitize” modern substations.

When process bus devices are properly configured according to the IEC 61850 standard, they provide fast, reliable and secure communications that

to support device protection, remote monitoring and remote control. Process buses can also provide control centers with situational awareness based on accurate and timely measurement data from all corners of the grid.

control center situational awareness based on accurate and timely measurement data from all corners of the grid. By connecting the data to the APM application, the data enables coordination between transmission sections and between transmission and distribution operators.

Hitachi ABB Power Grid APM

New asset performance management capabilities that connect directly to digital substations are expected to support all three priorities for the grid: high reliability, low cost and compliance.

However, developing a viable APM solution for the grid requires both significant domain expertise for these types of assets, as well as an understanding of these assets as a system.

It also requires a thorough understanding of how these assets work together as a system. Mathematical models based on first principles.

Simulating asset behavior in conjunction with operational statistics is a key approach to creating digital twins. A digital twin refers to a dynamic digital replica of the actual physical asset

and how it interacts with the larger grid and operators.

A digital twin refers to a dynamic digital replica of an actual physical asset and how it interacts with the larger grid and the humans who operate and maintain it.

The digital twin can include the spatial geometry of the asset and its location in the grid, as well as thermodynamic and electrical behavior.

APM, when applied effectively, can reduce OPEX and CAPEX based on predictive and prescriptive analytics, resulting in operational cost savings and/or deferring capital investment requirements.

APM can also help utilities achieve compliance as outages are reduced.