Laboratory SCADA

The SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data acquisition) laboratory, from the Department of Electrical Power Systems, is equipped with command-control and protection equipment typically used in high voltage substations of the National Power System. The laboratory was created by a collaboration between University “Politehnica” of Bucharest and N.C. Transelectrica SA, also with the support of Siemens Energy and Eneroptim companies.

The laboratory consists of five cubicles equipped with Bay Control Units (BCU) and typical numerical protections, such as distance and overcurrent current protections, and the differential protection for power transformer, which are connected to BCUs. The protection equipment is connected to the BCU type command-control equipment, such that to emulate a virtual "UPB" substation with two voltage levels, i.e. 220 and 100 kV, consisting of two 220 kV lines, one transversal couple, one measurement cubicle, one 220/110 kV power transformer, and one 110 kV line. The combination of the secondary equipment allows to perform tests and analysis for didactic and research purpose, being also a flexible infrastructure for training and for learning to operate in a high voltage power station.

The laboratory is also equipped with two servers similar with those from the real high voltage substations, which communicate with the equipment associated to the bay cubicles and being open to communicate with a higher level dispatch center, using modern protocols such as IEC 61850 and IEC 870-5-104.

The laboratory allows future developments, such as the development of the connection to a dispatch center - to be simulated in the lab, support for power flow calculations and for coupling its results with the real-time data of the SCADA system through a Hardware in the Loop (HIL) solution, mapping of each bay to a different point in a simulated power system, study of different power system operating conditions in a lab-controlled environment.