Motor control assets are foundational elements in many industrial operations. In the mining industry, these assets primarily consist of motor control centers and drives, which are available with a comprehensive assortment of control and monitoring devices. Various intelligent electronic devices (IEDs) are now used to prevent machine damage and downtime. As motor control devices have advanced in technology, so too have the IEDs that protect them. These advances have resulted in new standards, such as IEC 61850, that have embedded intelligence and a standard set of communication schemes by which IEDs can share information in a peer-to-peer or one-to-many fashion. This dissertation investigated the steps involved in interfacing IEDs to a mining process control network via the use of the IEC 61850 standard. As a result of this study, several key technological advancements were made including the development of (i) vendor independent system to communicate with IEDs in a mining environment over IEC 61850, (ii) command and control methods for communication based assisted automation of IEDs for mining firms, (iii) effective solutions to incorporate electrical distribution data in the process control system, (iv) enhanced safety platforms through remote operation of IEDs, (v) standard visualization faceplate graphics for HMI operators with enhanced security, and (vi) new methods for time stamped dataflow to be correctly inserted into a process historian for 'true' Sequence of Events Records. / Ph. D.

Η αναβάθμιση της διαδικασίας ανάπτυξης εφαρμογών λογισμικού που αφορούν τον έλεγχο βιομηχανικών συστημάτων, είναι ένα θέμα που απασχολεί για δεκαετίες του μηχανικούς ελέγχου αλλά και τους μηχανικούς λογισμικού. Κατά την ανάπτυξη των βιομηχανικών εφαρμογών, οι μηχανικοί καλούνται να ικανοποιήσουν πληθώρα απαιτήσεων μεταξύ των οποίων: συμβατότητα με το υπάρχον εγκατεστημένο υλικό, συμβατότητα με τις ήδη εγκατεστημένες παλαιότερες εφαρμογές και επαναχρησιμοποίηση τμημάτων λογισμικού. Για τους παραπάνω λόγους, αναζητούνται συνεχώς λύσεις οι οποίες: θα προσφέρουν μια περισσότερο φιλική προς το μηχανικό ελέγχου διαδικασία ανάπτυξης η οποία θα υποστηρίζει επεκτασιμότητα των εφαρμογών, θα διευκολύνει την επαναχρησιμοποίηση τμημάτων του λογισμικού, θα ενισχύει την συντήρηση του λογισμικού και θα είναι ανεξάρτητη από το υλικό εκτέλεσης των βιομηχανικών συστημάτων. Η International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) για να αντιμετωπίσει τις απαιτήσεις των σύγχρονων συστημάτων δημιούργησε το πρότυπο IEC61499 το οποίο έρχεται να επεκτείνει το Function Block του IEC61131. Το IEC61499, καθορίζει μια μεθοδολογία σχεδιασμού, όπου το Function Block είναι το βασικό δομικό συστατικό για την ανάπτυξη διαλειτουργικών κατανεμημένων εφαρμογών αυτοματισμού και ελέγχου. Οι εφαρμογές ελέγχου μπορούν να υλοποιηθούν από Function Block δίκτυα διασυνδέοντας τις εισόδους και εξόδους τους. Το IEC61499 προτείνει επίσης τον σχεδιασμό εργαλείων λογισμικού για την υποστήριξη (εν μέρει αυτοματοποίηση) της διαδικασίας ανάπτυξης. Στην παρούσα διατριβή, παρουσιάζεται μια νέα προσέγγιση για τον σχεδιασμό κατανεμημένων βιομηχανικών εφαρμογών και πιο συγκεκριμένα Συστημάτων Μέτρησης και Ελέγχου Βιομηχανικών Διεργασιών1 (IPMCSs) όπως τα ορίζει το πρότυπο IEC. Η προσέγγιση εστιάζει στον ορισμό μιας μεθοδολογίας για την φάση της ανάλυσης και κύρια την τεκμηρίωση των απαιτήσεων και τον μετέπειτα μετασχηματισμό του μοντέλου ανάλυσης σε μοντέλο σχεδιασμού. Η προτεινόμενη προσέγγιση βασίζεται σε κατάλληλα οριζόμενες έννοιες και τεχνικές και αξιοποιεί τελευταίες τάσεις από το χώρο της Μηχανιστικής Λογισμικού (Software Engineering), όπως είναι η έννοια της μετα-μοντελοποίησης (Meta-modeling) όπως αυτή ορίζεται στα πλαίσια της βασισμένης σε μοντέλα ανάπτυξης (Model Driven Development) και της Unified Modeling Language (UML) και των επεκτάσεων της (UML Profiles) και εφαρμογή αυτών στο σχεδιασμό βιομηχανικών εφαρμογών. Για την ομαλή μετάβαση από τις καταγεγραμμένες απαιτήσεις σε μοντέλα σχεδιασμού τεκμηριώθηκε και παρουσιάζεται ένα σύνολο κανόνων μετασχηματισμού το οποίο περιγράφηκε αυστηρά με χρήση της Object Constraint Language. Για να αξιοποιηθεί η προτεινόμενη προσέγγιση από μηχανικούς ελέγχου, σχεδιάστηκε και υλοποιήθηκε ένα εργαλείο λογισμικού συμβατό με το πρότυπο IEC61499. Το εργαλείο που έχει το όνομα CORFU ESS έρχεται να υποστηρίξει: α) την φάση της ανάλυσης, β) τον μετασχηματισμό του μοντέλου ανάλυσης σε μοντέλο σχεδιασμού, γ) τον σχεδιασμό εφαρμογών με Function Blocks όπως ορίζει το IEC61499, δ) την κατανομή των Function Block στις συσκευές των βιομηχανικών δικτύων και ε) τον έλεγχο των τελικών Function Block δικτύων. Η προσέγγιση εφαρμόσθηκε σε μελέτες περίπτωσης για να επιδείξει την εφαρμοσιμότητα της προτεινόμενης διαδικασίας, την αποτελεσματικότητα του εργαλείου που αναπτύχθηκε και την δυνατότητα της διαδικασίας και του εργαλείου να καλύψουν απαιτήσεις μικρής ή μεγάλης κλίμακας εφαρμογών. / Following technology’s trends, engineers in the industrial and control sector continuously face problems on developing distributed industrial control applications that should meet various functional, interface, operational and performance requirements by conforming on engineering concerns such as maintainability and reliability. During the development of industrial applications, engineers deal with aspects on device compatibility, software compatibility and software reusability. To deal with these challenges, control engineers are underway in applying Software Engineering practices in the development process of distributed industrial control applications that will enhance reusability, maintainability and will be independent of the underlying platform. A proof of this motion is the standard 61499 of the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) which is affected from practices and current trends in Software Engineering. The IEC 61499 standard extends the FB concept of IEC1131 to share many of the well defined and already widely acknowledged benefits of concepts introduced by object technology. This standard describes also a methodology that defines the FB as the main building block and specifies the way that FBs can be used to define robust, re-usable software components that constitute complex IPMCSs. Complete control applications, can be built from networks of FBs that are formed by interconnecting their inputs and outputs. IEC 61499 proposes also that, Engineering Support Systems (ESSs) are highly required to support the whole development process. This dissertation presents a new approach for the design of distributed industrial control applications or Industrial Process Measurement and Control Systems (IPMCSs) as defined in the IEC 61499. The approach defines a methodology for the analysis phase, based on object-oriented concepts, and mainly focuses in the requirements specification and the transformation from the analysis model to the design model. The approach is based on properly defined concepts and adopts modern techniques and latest trends from Software Engineering such as the concept of metamodeling, Model Driven Development (MDL), the Unified Modeling language (UML), UML extensions as defined in UML profiles and applies them to the design of distributed industrial control applications. For the transition from requirements specification to design models a set of transformation rules is presented, formally specified by means of the Object Constraint Language, that are used to later to automate the transition process. Towards the automation and the exploitation from control engineers of the proposed approach, a prototype ESS that supports the development process and is compatible with IEC61499 was implemented. The ESS named CORFU ESS comes to support all the phases of the proposed process: the object-oriented analysis, the automated transformation process from the analysis to the design model, the design with Function Blocks as proposed from the IEC 61499 standard, the verification of Function Block diagrams and the distribution of Function Blocks to industrial field devices. In order to verify the development process, several case studies have been designed and are presented in the context of this dissertation in order to prove: the applicability of the proposed approach, the effectiveness of the implemented prototype ESS and the ability of the approach to cover small and large scale applications.

A thesis which models the DNP3 and IEC 61850 protocol in OPNET / Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) is a critical part of monitoring and controlling of the electrical substation. The aim of this dissertation is to investigate the performance of the Distributed Network Protocol Version 3.3 (DNP3) protocol and to compare its performance to that of International Electro-technical Commission (IEC) 61850 protocol in an electrical substation communication network environment. Building an electrical substation control room and installing the network equipment was going to be expensive and take a lot of time. The better option was to build a model of the electrical substation communication network and run simulations. Riverbend modeller academic edition known as Optimized Network Engineering Tool (OPNET) was chosen as a software package to model substation communication network, DNP3 protocol and IEC 61850 Protocol stack. Modelling the IEC 61850 protocol stack on OPNET involved building the used Open System Interconnection (OSI) layers of the IEC 61850 protocol stack onto the application definitions of OPNET. The Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) configuration settings of DNP3 protocol were also modelled on the OPNET application definitions. The aim is to compare the two protocols and determine which protocol is the best performing one in terms of throughput, data delay and latency. The substation communication model consists of 10 ethernet nodes which simulate protection Intelligent Electronic Devices (IEDs), 13 ethernet switches, a server which simulates the substation Remote Terminal Unit (RTU) and the DNP3 Protocol over TCP/IP simulated on the model. DNP3 is a protocol that can be used in a power utility computer network to provide communication service for the grid components. DNP3 protocol is currently used at Eskom as the communication protocol because it is widely used by equipment vendors in the energy sector. DNP3 protocol will be modelled before being compared to the new recent robust protocol IEC 61850 in the same model and determine which protocol is the best for Eskom on the network of the power grid. The network load and packet delay parameters were sampled when 10%, 50%, 90% and 100% of devices are online. The IEC 61850 protocol model has three scenarios and they are normal operation of a Substation, maintenance in a Substation and Buszone operation at a Substation. In these scenarios packet end to end delay of Generic Object Oriented Substation Event (GOOSE), vi © University of South Africa 2020 Generic Substation Status Event (GSSE), Sampled Values (SV) and Manufacturing Messaging Specification (MMS) messages are monitored. The throughput from the IED under maintenance and the throughput at the Substation RTU end is monitored in the model. Analysis of the results of the DNP3 protocol simulation showed that with an increase in number of nodes there was an increase in packet delay as well as the network load. The load on the network should be taken into consideration when designing a substation communication network that requires a quick response such as a smart gird. GOOSE, GSSE, SV results on the IEC 61850 model met all the requirements of the IEC 61850 standard and the MMS did not meet all the requirements of the IEC standard. The design of the substation communication network using IEC 61850 will assist when trying to predict the behavior of the network with regards to this specific protocol during maintenance and when there are faults in the communication network or IED’s. After the simulation of the DNP3 protocol and the IEC 61850 the throughput of DNP3 protocol was determined to be in the range (20 – 450) kbps and the throughput of IEC61850 protocol was determined to be in the range (1.6 – 16) Mbps. / College of Engineering, Science and Technology / M. Tech. (Electrical Engineering)

Thesis submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree Master of Technology: Electrical Engineering in the Faculty of Engineering at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology, 2012 / The introduction of the IEC 61850 standard in substations for communication networks and systems by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) in 2003 provided the possibility for communication between devices of different manufacturers. However, the advent of this standard also brought about many challenges associated with it. The challenges introduced by this fairly recent standard of communications in Substation Automation Systems (SAS), and the need for the development of cost effective IEC 61850- compliant devices, motivated the decision of the Centre for Substation and Energy Management Systems within the Electrical Engineering Department of the Cape Peninsula University of Technology to focus on the implementation of the IEC 61850 standard using an embedded hardware platform. The development of an IEC 61850 embedded application requires substantial knowledge in multiple domains such as data networking, software modelling and development of Intelligent Electronic Devices (IEDs), protection of the electrical system, system simulation and testing methods, etc. Currently knowledge about the implementation of the IEC 61850 standard usually resides with vendors and is not in the public domain. The IEC 61850 standard allows for two groups of communication services between entities within the substation automation system. One group utilizes a client-server model accommodating services such as Reporting and Remote Switching. The second group utilizes a peer-to-peer model for Generic Substation Event (GSE) services associated with time-critical activities such as fast and reliable communication between Intelligent Electronic Devices (IEDs) used for protection of the power network. The messages associated with the GSE services are the Generic Object Oriented Substation Event (GOOSE) messages. The use of GOOSE messages for protection of the electrical system is very important in modern substations. Detailed knowledge of the structure of these messages is important in instances requiring fault diagnosis to determine the cause of mal– operation or to address interoperability concerns or when developing custom IEC 61850- compliant devices with limited functionality. A practical protection application (overcurrent) case study is presented where GOOSE messages are exchanged between a commercial IED and an IEC 61850-compliant controller based on an embedded platform. The basic data model and software development of an actuator node for a circuit breaker is proposed using an IEC 61850 communication stack on an embedded platform. The performance of the GOOSE messages is confirmed to be as per the functional behaviour specified, and per the IEC 68150 standard in terms of the temporal behaviour required. This thesis document tables the methods, software programs, hardware interfacing and system integration techniques that allow for the development and implementation of a low cost IEC 61850-compliant controller unit on an embedded systems platform for the substation automation system. The overcurrent case study distributed between a commercial IED (SIEMENS Siprotec device) and the actuator application developed on an embedded platform for this project (DK60 board) is in compliance with the IEC 61850 standard and utilizing GOOSE messaging is successfully completed both in terms of functional and temporal behaviour. This novel research work contributes not only to the academic community, but to the international Power Systems community as a whole. Keywords: IEC 61850 standard, IEDs, GOOSE message, software modelling, software development, substation automation systems, communication stack, embedded systems, actuator.