EMR-5000
IM02602012E
IEC 61850
IEC61850
Introduction
To understand the functioning and mode of operation of a substation in an IEC 61850 automation environment, it is
useful to compare the commissioning steps with those of a conventional substation in a Modbus TCP environment. In a
conventional substation, the individual Intelligent Electronic Devices (IEDs) communicate in a vertical direction with the
higher level control center via Communication. The horizontal communication is exclusively realized by wiring relay
outputs (RO) and digital inputs (DI) together.
In an IEC 61850 environment, communication between the IEDs takes place digitally (via Ethernet) by a service called
Generic Object Oriented Substation Event (GOOSE). By means of this service, information about events is submitted
between each IED. Therefore each IED has to know about the functional capability of all other connected IEDs.
Each IEC 61850 capable device includes a description of its own functionality and communications skills (IED
Capability Description, *.ICD). By means of a Substation Configuration Tool to describe the structure of the substation,
assignment of the devices to the primary technique, etc., virtual wiring of the IEDs between each other and with other
switch gear of the substation can be achieved. A description of the substation configuration will be generated in the
form of a *.SCD file. Finally, this file has to be submitted to each device. Now the IEDs are able to communicate with
each other, react to interlockings, and operate switch gear.
www.eaton.com
328
IED1
IED2
IED3
IEC61850
Master
Ethernet
C
om
m
IE
C
61
85
0
GOOSE IEC61850 soft wiring
IED1
IED2
IED3
Modbus-TCP
Master
Ethernet
C
om
m
M
od
bu
sT
C
P
Conventional hard wiring
DI
RO
DI
RO
DI
RO
