IEC TC 88 Started Work on SCL for Wind Power Plants

WOW! IEC TC 88 has published a new work item proposal (88/621/NP) for the specification of extending the SCL (System Configuration Language):

Wind energy generation systems –
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 objective of the NWIP is to describe the adoption of the System Configuration description Language (SCL) defined in IEC 61850-6 to the wind domain

"This part would extend the IEC 61400-25 series with a file format for describing communication-related IED (Intelligent Electronic Device) configurations of a wind turbine, wind power plant controller, metrological mast etc. The extension of SCL to wind domain would simplify integration of wind power plant equipment as well as their integration to the electrical system. The adoption of SCL allows formalised tool based exchange of IED parameters, communication system configurations, switch yard (function) structures, as well as description of the relations between them.
The purpose of this format is to formally and efficiently exchange wind turbine and wind power plant IED capability descriptions, and system descriptions between IED engineering tools and the system
engineering tool(s) of different manufacturers in a compatible way. The file format is also intended for providing report configuration and alarms as well as HMI interface information from a wind power plant. This information can be used to engineer overlying SCADA systems for the site, for connected DSO, TSO or fleet operators maintenance and surveillance systems. Finally, the SCL is intended as a documentation of the configuration and topology of the delivered system."

WOW! Why a WOW? During the fist years of standardization of the series IEC 61400-25 the proposal of applying and extending the SCL (IEC 61850-6) did not find enough support to start working on the issue! Time is passing and more and more experts understand the advantage of SCL!

Good luck.

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?