Visualization and Animation of State Estimation Performance

Reliable real time system "visibility" depends on a reliable and accurate state estimator. Present experience with state estimators indicates that its reliability is below expectations (an average of 5% non-convergent cases). The causes of this poor performance have been identified in earlier work by the authors and alternative robust state estimators have been proposed. For any state estimator, it is important to develop techniques for monitoring the performance of the state estimator and identification of potential problems such as bad sensors, consistent errors, modeling errors, etc. The paper presents visualization and animation methods that assist this process. It is demonstrated that bad data many times can be detected via visualization methods. The methodologies are demonstrated with a hybrid three-phase state estimator which addresses the issue of systematic errors from modeling and imbalance errors. This estimator is enhanced by visualization and animation methods that provide valuable information to users and system operators "at a glance". The procedure and the visualization techniques are demonstrated on TVA\´s 500 kV transmission system.