Time Synchronization of Automation Controllers for Power Applications

This paper investigates various forms of industrial time synchronization and applies these methods to programmable automation controllers (PACs) for power system applications. PACs have been used in the industry for many control applications, and advancements in synchronization technology have allowed PACs to be used in high-speed control and data acquisition systems. This paper looks at using the PAC as a time-synchronized sequence-of-events recorder for substation automation. It is shown that a PAC can be time synchronized to multiple time references and provide accuracies accepted by the power industry.