IEC CDV files available for Public Commenting - circulation date 2023-08-11

 Dear Friends of IEC standards, I just remember you that IEC lets you comment on published CDVs (Committe Draft for Vote) ... 

Click HERE for general rules, :

IEC Public Commenting

Help shape international standards if you have the requisite technical expertise. Public commenting on draft IEC Standards is open for a two month period

Currently the following IEC 61850 document is open for comments ... you have to login with your IEC account or register for an account:

57/2602/CDV 

IEC 61850-6/AMD2 ED2: Amendment 2 -
Communication networks and systems for power utility automation -
Part 6: Configuration description language for communication in electrical substations related to IEDs 

CLOSING DATE FOR VOTING: 2023-11-03

Please take your time to review the document ... You may agree with me that part 6 (SCL) is a crucial part of the series IEC 61850!

IEC 61850 To Help Securing Process Automation Systems

A Hacker Tried to Poison a Florida City's Water Supply ... the attacker upped sodium hydroxide levels in the Oldsmar, Florida, water supply to extremely dangerous levels ... Within seconds, the intruder was attempting to change the water supply's levels of sodium hydroxide, also known as lye or caustic soda, moving the setting from 100 parts per million to 11,100 parts per million. 

Click HERE for a news report.

How could that happen? Who knows!

There are a lot of discussions complaining about missing security measures like VPN, etc.

Independent of the communication security it is a big mistake that the value could be set to such a BIG number: 11,100 ppm.

IEC 61850 could help to prevent such a situation by applying Analogue Setting model:

At the City of Oldsmar water treatment facility, the "maxVal" of Sodium Hydroxide injection may have been limited to 500 ppm ... as a consequence, there would be no way to configure this to 11,000 ppm.

And: in case somebody changed the value at all, the setMag would change and dchg would become true issuing a report or log entry ...

With the SCL (System Configuration Language, IEC 61850) it could also be configured (in SCL notation) that a particular configuration value could not be changed at all (Fix), changed by a service (Dyn), or changed by SCL only (Conf).

For Input signals there are many specific configuration attributes defined ... 

It is very difficult to convince programmers, managers, R&D people, any other group ... to apply the IEC 61850 Tool.

Hope that will slowly change ... 

Additional discussion by Jake Brodsky click HERE ... summarizing: "... The more self integrity features we include, the more reasonable process limits that we include, the safer we will be."

IEC 61850 und eCl@ss - Interoperabilität durch standardisierte Informationsmodelle

Interoperabilität durch standardisierte Informationsmodelle

Der „eCl@ss“-Standard ermöglicht den digitalen Austausch von Produktstammdaten über Branchen, Länder, Sprachen oder Organisationen hinweg. Wie ein Produkt nach „eCl@ss“ mit Merkmalen nach IEC 61850 ganzheitlich zur Interoperabilität auf den Ebenen Produktbeschreibung, Systemengineering, Gerätekonfiguration, Informationsaustausch und Protokolle ergänzt werden kann, zeigt der nachfolgende (frei herunterladbare 5-seitige) Beitrag im etz Heft 12/2019 (Link siehe unten):

Hier klicken, um das gesamte etz Heft 12/2019 inklusive des obigen Beitrags (Seiten 30-35) herunterzuladen. 

First Amendment of IEC 61850-4: System and Project Management

IEC TC 57 just published the IEC 61850-4 Amendment 1 (57/1922/CDV)
– Communication networks and systems for power utility automation
– Part 4: System and project management

The main extensions of the edition 2 are:

1. New sub-chapter 5.3.6 describes the engineering tool workflow and its chronology (which SCL files are exchanged in between configuration tools) through 3 use cases: the classical use case, the change of system tool and the interaction between 2 projects.
2. New sub-chapter 6.4 talks about backward compatibility and deals with replacement or extension whatever the component is provided by the same or different manufacturer. To do so, it scrutinizes through 4 use cases, what kind of impacts could be acceptable for IED or tools.

The ballot closes 2018-02-02.
The CDV (committee draft for vote) is accessible for PUBLIC comments by every interested person.

Note that the amendment has already been blended into the edition 2 document for easier reading: 57/1923/INF

These extensions answer a couple of questions that come up during every seminar and in many discussions. They are extending the explanations of SCL (part 6).
The document is worth to study.

Why Wikipedia Misleads People Looking for Help regarding IEC 61850

How do people understand and learn what the standard series IEC 61850 really offers to the protection, automation and supervision of energy systems and what this all means for their application (as vendor, user, consultant, ...)? Some up-to-date discussion you can find on this blog, e.g., by this posting:

Who can tell you what IEC 61850 really is?

Some people (managers and ...) just go to Wikipedia and believe that they get a reasonable overview about IEC 61850. After reading the German and English version, they have learned: That IEC 61850 is mainly a PROTOCOL standard!

German Version tells in the very first sentence:

"Die Norm IEC 61850 der International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) beschreibt ein allgemeines Übertragungsprotokoll für die Schutz- und Leittechnik in elektrischen Schaltanlagen der Mittel- und Hochspannungstechnik (Stationsautomatisierung)."

English Version talks a lot about PROTOCOLS:

"IEC 61850 is a standard for vendor-agnostic engineering of the configuration of Intelligent Electronic Devices for electrical substation automation systems to be able to communicate with each other. ... The abstract data models defined in IEC 61850 can be mapped to a number of protocols. Current mappings in the standard are to MMS (Manufacturing Message Specification), GOOSE (Generic Object Oriented Substation Event), SMV (Sampled Measured Values),[clarification needed] and soon to Web Services. These protocols can run over TCP/IP networks or substation LANs using high speed switched Ethernet to obtain the necessary response times below four milliseconds for protective relaying."

After reading these two pages ... some managers believe that IEC 61850 is mainly dealing with protocols. Protocols are required to exchange information between devices.
IEC 61850 deals mainly with the description of signal flows between any point of a (power or energy) system that generates information (status, measurements, alarms, settings, ...) and those points that need to receive or consume this information.(protection, automation, SADA, control center, ... asset management, ...).
The signal flow could be completely described (and documented) as an SCL file of tens of Mega Bytes ... such files have almost nothing to do with protocols - but the tools that design and engineer systems like substations are key to the future systems. SCL is defined in one document (IEC 61850-6). This document has the biggest impact on how we manage power systems in the future.
In my understanding SCL is likely 2/3 of the importance of IEC 61850. Then there are the many crucial models - and finally we have protocols. Protocols are crucial when it comes to devices that have to send and receive signals - no discussion.

Unfortunately the managers (and everybody) that uses Wikipedia for understanding the impact of IEC 61850 are completely mislead! And likely may not understand how IEC 61850 impacts the system design and engineering based on SCL - aspects that are today usually not linked to any protocol.

If the resources for a project to implementing and using IEC 61850 is determined by the assumption that IEC 61850 is another PROTOCOL - then it is likely that the project will fail to get what IEC 61850 could provide.

This post was triggered by a discussion during an IEC 61850 Seminar and hands-on training recently. It is really frustrating for engineers to discuss the needed resources with managers that believe IEC 61850 is mainly a PROTOCOL.

Who can tell you what IEC 61850 really is?

Wind Energy Generation Systems - About to Use and Extend SCL

IEC TC 88 (Wind energy generation systems) has just published a new work item proposal for the series IEC 61400-25 (Communications for monitoring and control of wind power plants):

(88/621/NP):
Part 25-7: Communications for monitoring and control of wind power plants –
Configuration description language for communication in wind automation systems related to IEDs

The voting closes 2017-04-21.

The scope of this NWIP is to describe the adoption of the System Configuration description Language (SCL) defined in IEC 61850-6 to the wind domain.

Machine-processable Format of IEC 61850-related Data Models

IEC TC 57 proposes a new work item (57/1768/NP) IEC 61850-7-7:

Communication networks and systems for power utility automation – Part 7-7: Basic communication structure – Machine-processable format of IEC 61850-related data models for tools (proposed 61850-7-7)

Closing date for voting: 2016-11-25

This technical specification will define an XML schema for describing the code components of the data model parts of IEC 61850, to be used as input for tools (typically engineering or specification tools).

In order to foster an active tool market with good quality, and at the end to improve IEC 61850 interoperability, the market needs a machine-processable file describing data model related parts of the standard as input.
This will avoid the need for any engineering tool related to the IEC 61850 datamodel to get the content of the standard manually entered, with the highest risk of mistakes.

The NP comes with a 150 page draft.

How to Exchange a Voltage Measurement with IEC 61850?

As discussed before you will find a reasonable example to learn the benefits of applying IEC 61850.
Let's look at a voltage measurement:



According to IEC Electropedia we find many names for the same semantic: voltage, Spannung, spenning, ... Ok. These help humans to understand what we are talking about. But what about machines (controllers, SCADA systems, ..)?
They have to use a data type (int16, int32, float32, ...) and a reference (address ...) for a specific protocol like Modbus. Each vendor will likely use different types and addresses.
What's about the scale in applications that use integer? Is the scale known when you read the value of a voltage? Do you know the offset or the multiplier (V, kV, mV, ...)?
How do you know where the measurement is taken in the electrical system (location in the single line diagram)?
Answers to these questions may be found in a set of documents sitting on a shelf or on someones computer - hard to find out if the owner is on vacation.
With IEC 61850 we have a model that could be implemented so that all these details are always accessible online from each device that is a source of measurements:



Phase A voltage has a standard name "MMXU.PhV.phsA" with the value, quality, timestamp, units, and scale. These names are used all over in any IEC 61850 device.

IEC 61850 services allow to retrieve the MMXU model and read the values:



The device has all information to interpret the voltage value for phase A.

Finally we need to know where the value is measured in the single line diagram. IEC 61850-6 (SCL) provides the solution specified as an SCL file (simplified SSD - Substation Specification Description):


The above voltage could be designated as follows:
MySub_400kV_3A63_BayFunction_ABC/ACMMXU1.PhV.phsA

The value is located in the device "BayController". The device is communication wise identified by an IP Address.

This information really exposes all information needed to interpret a measurement. 

Note that this name needs not to be communicated when the value is reported cyclically or issued by a limit change.The report message could only carry the value, quality and timestamp.

The SCL file has all information to configure the whole system and the devices.

Any question?

Hope you have learned this: IEC 61850 goes very far beyond a protocol! We only need the protocol when we retrieve the selfdescription or read out or report the values.

And: the nice thing is that any device that implements the standard uses the same model, configuration, and services. What else do we need?

If we would apply just a protocol like Modbus then most of the information exposed (directly from the device) through the standard IEC 61850 would have to be stored in paper docs or excel sheets ... 

Experience with the OMICRON IEDScout Version 4.10 - The Name Space Concept

As you may know we have defined a very powerful namespace concept into IEC 61850. It allows to use logical nodes and data objects from multiple application domains in one single SCL File.
This concept has been incorporated into the standard (IEC 61850-6, -7-1, -7-2, -7-3, 7-4, and 8-1) some 15 years ago. At that time I was the editor of parts -7-1 and -7-2.
By the way: These five (5) parts are often called "The Core Parts of IEC 61850".

The name space “IEC 61850-7-4:2003” indicates that ALL instances within this logical device
are derived from the 2003 editions of IEC 61850-7-4, IEC 61850-7-3, and IEC 61850-7-2. The logical device name space could be understood as the prime name space. The attribute ldNs is an attribute contained in the name plate of the logical node zero (LLN0).
A device that implements more than one Logical Device can support multiple prime name spaces - one per Logical Device.

The name space for Edition 2 of the core documents is as follows:

        IEC 61850-7-4:2007A

The Omicron IEDScout V4.1 analyzes this Logical Device name space and acts according to the name space configured. Let's see how that works.

If the LD name space is missing then the default value will be used: this means Edition 1 of the core documents).
The following figure shows an SCL file that does not contain a value for the "ldNs". Now we open the SCL file with the IEDScout 4.1.The IEDScout figures out that the prime name space is Edition 1 of the core parts. In Edition 1 of IEC 61850-7-3 (Common Data Classes) there are no CDCs like ENS and ENC defined. This is indicated in the warning area. Edition 1 of IEC 61850-7-3 defines INS and INC instead.



The new enumerated Common Data Classes (ENS, ENC and ENG) have been added in Edition 2 of IEC 61850-7-3. The SCL File with the Edition 2 prime name space is shown next:


The IEDScout does not show any warning!

Smart!

What does that mean for all of us? We have to make sure that our IEC 61850 models configured in an SCL File are according to the prime name space we want to use!

And: The IEDScout has many other powerful (browsing, testing, ...) features build-in that help you to get your IEC 61850 based system running according to the standard series IEC 61850, IEC 61400-25, ...

I am using the IEDScout 4.1 in my training courses. Attendees learn how to model IEDs and how to test them.

Click HERE for downloading a 30 days fully functional evaluation license.

CDV of IEC 61850-6 Amendment 1 and IEC 62351-9 available for comments

IEC TC 57 has published the following documents for review:

57/1697/CDV
IEC 61850-6 A1: Amendment 1 to IEC 61850-6 Ed.2:Communication networks and systems for power utility automation -
Part 6: Configuration description language for communication in electrical substations related to IEDs

The Amendment incorporates 60 Tissues - listed in the CDV document. You can find easily what has been revised.

57/1699/CDV
IEC 62351-9: Power systems management and associated information exchange - Data and communications security -
Part 9: Cyber security key management for power system equipment

Please take some time to review both documents.
The documents should be available online for reading and for comments.
Check HERE for the access and for providing comments.

Protection and Control with IEC 61850 – Very Successful Training in Prague (CZ)

Two crucial application domains for IEC 61850 are the Power Protection and Power Control – no doubt. What does this mean for the electrical engineers responsible for the reliability of the Power System? A lot!

The first 3 days joint Seminar of FMTP Power and NettedAutomation in Prague, CZ, (8-10 December 2014) was very successful. The Training was held in the Holiday Inn (Congress).

 

The 3 days were split between presentations and demonstrations of general IEC 61850 issues and special protection issues. The main topics were centered around the impact of IEC 61850 on the protection. Andrea Bonetti (FMTP) used several test tools from ABB and Megger, as well as an ABB protection relay (REL 670):

Andrea is one of the developers of the ABB series 670 and the Megger GOOSER. He really knows what he is talking about – when it comes to protection.

The attendees were absolute happy with the many lessons learned during the three days fully packed with experience. Note that Andrea has spent some time of his life in substations – many days and nights … listen to him next time:

Ecuador, Jan 26-29, 2015
Brussels, Feb 16-18, 2015
China, March 9-11, 2015
Bratislava, Apr 20-22, 2015
Berlin, May 18-20, 2015

Additional courses are in preparation.

Video on the Use of IEC 61850-6 SCL to configure a server and a client

This presentation explains the use of two IED specific SCL files to configure IEDs. One is used to configure a server and the second (with the same model - but different bindings between the model and the real data) is used to configure a client. The API "Write call " at the client and the "Write callback" at the server are briefly explained. The API is provided by SystemCorp (Bentley, Western Australia). The API is available at the Beck IPC Chip and other embedded controllers, or for Windows (DLL) and Linux.

Click HERE for an evaluation kit running on a PC (with DLL and applications). The evaluation package runs for six months. It uses two SCL files for configuring the server and the client (as shown in the video).

I hope you will enjoy this video!
Your feedback to Karlheinz Schwarz would be appreciated.