Reducing conventional copper signaling in high voltage substations with IEC 61850 process bus system

This paper describes a practical IEC 61850 process bus architecture suitable for high voltage substations. The presented system eliminates the need for thousands of copper wires in a substation and replaces them with a few fiber optics cables, and can save utilities spending related to current installation and maintenance costs while at the same time increasing worker safety and power system reliability. The paper contains application example as well as description of experience from the real installation of the process bus system at 345 kV substation.