Digital Electrical Substation Communications Based on Deterministic Time-Sensitive Networking Over Ethernet

This work presents a novel use case with Time-Sensitive Networks (TSN) for implementing a deterministic system allowing the joint transmission of all substation communications over the same Ethernet-based infrastructure. This approach streamlines the transition to Smart Grid by simplifying the typically complex architecture of electrical substations, characterized by multiple field buses and bridging devices. Thus, Smart Grid represents a disruptive innovation advancing substations to an “all-digital” environment with a uniform interface to access, manage, and update their communications and variables. TSN can serve as its underlying foundation as it is based on open, interoperable standards and enhancements for Ethernet that can establish deterministic communications with bounded end-to-end latency. This is shown with a TSN Proof of Concept (PoC) in a real-life substation that can integrate its most usual signals: digitized analog triggers for critical events or interlocks, GOOSE signaling (IEC 61850), and Best-Effort “Internet-like” traffic. This TSN PoC is shown to be versatile enough to propagate digitized critical events around 160 μs earlier than legacy substation equipment while preserving the integrity of background traffic. Furthermore, its flexibility was characterized in-depth in controlled laboratory tests, thereby confirming TSN as a viable alternative for supporting Smart Grid so long as the appropriate configuration is supplied.