Sandia Labs FY22 Laboratory Directed Research & Development Annual Report

FY22 ANNUAL REPORT

SIGNAL-BASED FAST-TRIPPING PROTECTION SCHEMES FOR ELECTRIC POWER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM RESILIENCE.

When it comes to national security, it is imperative to accurately detect and quickly remove electrical faults for power system resilience and minimize impacts to defense critical infrastructure. This LDRD team developed novel methods to detect faults in the electric power grid, which are dramatically faster than today’s protection systems. Their new signal-based fast-tripping schemes will improve grid stability during disturbances and allow additional integration of

renewable energy technologies with low inertia and low fault currents, as they use the physics of the grid and don’t rely on communication to reduce cyber risks for safely removing faults. Highly accurate fault location methods were developed for distribution systems, AC and DC microgrids, using high-frequency sensors and signal processing techniques. The algorithms will use less than 0.5 ms of data and compute the fault location within 2 ms for fast tripping

protection schemes. This project generated 20 publications, received the best paper award at the 2020 IEEE Kansas Power and Energy Conference, and resulted in several Technical Advances and patents being filed. Faculty, postdoc, and graduate students from Sandia Alliance partner University of New Mexico, Sandia National/Regional partner New Mexico State University, Alliance partner Georgia Tech, and Clemson University collaborated on the project, as did industry partners Siemens, Emera Technology, and Quanta Technology. (PI: Matthew Reno)

PI Matthew Reno worked with IEEE to develop the first standards for microgrid protection.

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