Online Dynamic Parameter Estimation of
Transformer Equivalent Circuit
M. Reza Feyzi and Mehran Sabahi
Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran
feyzi@tabrizu.ac.ir
Abstract. The dynamic parameters of a transformer,
including its inductances and resistances, are estimated by
the application of recursive least squares routine on the
measured terminal voltages and currents. The harmonic
content of the measured input parameters can be included
in the proposed method. The estimation is carried out while
the transformer is under load. Therefore, the estimated
parameters are obtained in real time conditions taking the
saturation effects into account. The procedure needs no
additional data and/or initial assumption. As a stable RLS
routine, the U.D. Bierman’s method is used to ensure long
period convergence of the parameter estimation procedure.
Forgetting factors are proposed and used to accelerate the
convergence of the estimation and improve the accuracy of
the parameters.
Keywords- Parameter Estimation; Transformer
I. INTRODUCTION
Transformers are one of the main components of any
power system. An accurate estimation of system behavior,
including load flow studies, protection, and safe control of
the system calls for an accurate equivalent circuit
parameters of all system components such as generators,
transformers, etc. Different models have been proposed
for dynamic and transient structure of transformers [1-2].
Different long time off-line estimation methods have
been proposed using frequency response analyses [3],
steady state analyses [4] and recently genetic algorithms
[5].
In this paper, an on line time domain estimation routine
is proposed to estimate the dynamic equivalent circuit
parameters of the transformer at its actual operating point.
The proposed method allows including the effect of
possible unbalancing, saturation, or nonlinear loads and
harmonic content of the voltages and currents. Therefore,
the direct sampling of input and output voltages and
currents of a transformer are needed to provide the
required information for the estimation mechanism. The
parameters of each phase can be considered separately
and therefore the unbalancing of the system will have no
effect on the accuracy of the estimated parameters.
The method is applied on a typical transformer as the
model. The transformer equivalent circuit of this
transformer is represented as two time discrete equations
in the terms of measurable values in the form of “Auto
1-4244-0449-5/06/$20.00 ©2006 IEEE
sabahi@tabrizu.ac.ir
Regressive Moving Average” (ARMA) equations which
are suitable for online estimations methods. Then required
information is obtained from the simulation of the
modeled transformer using PSCAD software [6]. The
acquired data from the simulation is launched to the
estimation mechanism in order to adjust the estimated
parameters by minimizing the error between the actual
model parameters and the corresponding estimated
parameters.
II. ESTIMATION ALGORITHM
Based on output of the observations of a system and
their comparison with estimated values from the model, a
so called “cost function” is defined. It is essential that the
selected model to be observable so that the input signals
could be exited in every modes of the model. Input signals
may be regular system variations or random disturbances.
Least squares algorithm is basically an offline method
and counted as an explicit routine for fixed parameters,
not a suitable algorithm for online estimations with
variable parameters. By some modification, the Recursive
Least Square (RLS) algorithm is obtained. The new
algorithm is capable of online estimation and allows
gradual variations of system parameters. In order to apply
RLS algorithm on an adaptive or self tuning systems, the
estimation of parameters should be in a recursive relation
with data from the previous steps so that the estimated
parameters are updated every time step. Fig. 1 shows the
procedure as a simple block diagram.
If k is assumed to be the time step number, the RLS
algorithm performs the following stages in (k + 1) th step:
i. The new input vector, x(k + 1) is formed by using the
newly sampled data,
ii. New estimation error is calculated from (1).
ε (k + 1) = y (k + 1) − y(k + 1)
(1)
ˆ (k )
where : yˆ (k + 1) = xT (k + 1)Θ
iii. New value of covariance matrix P(k + 1) is
obtained from (2) where I np represents the unit matrix,
 x(k + 1)xT (k + 1)P(k ) 
P(k + 1) = P (k ) I −  (2)
 np 1 + x (k + 1)P (k )x(k + 1) 
T
IPEMC 2006
 iv. The estimated parameters are updated using (3).
I1 I2
L1 R1 Em R2 L2
∧ ∧
Θ(k + 1) = Θ(k + 1) + P(k + 1)x(k + 1)ε (k + 1) (3)
+ +
Im2 Im2
v. Finally, wait to receive new observations and return V1
Rm Lm
V2
to the first step. _ _

SYSTEM Figure 2. Transformer dynamic equivalent circuit

PARAMETERS
x(k+1) y(k+1)
+
_
MODEL
PARAMETERS e(k+1)

UPDATE
MECHANISM

Figure 1. Recursive estimation algorithm

The parameters in recent equations are as follows:

ε ( k + 1) : Estimation error

y (k + 1) : Real system output

xT (k + 1) : Data vector
Figure 3. Secondary voltage, V2
yˆ( k + 1) : Estimation model output
ˆ (k ) :
Θ Estimation parameter vector IV. TRANSFORMER ESTIMATION MODEL

Only four variables, including the primary and

Selection of the time step period, TS, depends on the secondary voltages and currents are readily available for
maximum frequency of output data. Theoretically the sampling in an actual transformer. The same parameters
minimum frequency of sampling should be at least two are extracted and sampled from the equivalent circuit of
times as large as the highest harmonic frequency of the the modeled transformer during the estimation process.
input data. There is no explicit rule to select the sampling Application of KVL on the secondary loop of the
period. A self tuning system, where the sampling period is equivalent circuit results in equation (4) as follows:
selected adaptively, is an appropriate method to study
frequency response of such models. di 1 di
v 1 = L1 + R 1i 1 − R 2i 2 − L 2 2 + v 2 (4)
dt dt
III. APPLICATION OF THE PROPOSED METHOD
In practice, an actual transformer can be used to gather An approximation as equation (5) is used to convert
exact values of currents and voltages by online sampling. equation (4) to a discrete time domain:
In this work, the equivalent circuit of a 2400/240 V, 15
kVA transformer is used for this purpose. The main df (t ) 1
≈ [F (k + 1) − F (k − 1)] (5)
parameters of the transformer, all refereed to the low dt 2Ts
voltage side, are given in table 1. Fig. 2 shows the most
popular dynamic equivalent circuit of a transformer. This TS is the sampling time period. Using (4) and (5), the
model is simulated by using PSCAD software to obtain first estimation equation in the ARMA form is obtained as
the required data for estimation mechanism. The input (6):
voltage of the transformer is assumed to contain some 3rd
and 5th harmonics in order to generalize the procedure. I1 (k + 1) − I1 (k − 1) = θ11(V1 (k) − V2 (k )) + θ12 I1 (k)
Fig. 3 shows the distorted secondary voltage of the (6)
+ θ13 (I 2 (k + 1) − I 2 (k − 1)) + θ14 I 2 (k )
transformer.
TABLE I. SELECTED MODEL VALUES
Therefore, the standard form of estimation can be
defined as follows:
R1 [Ω] R2 [Ω] Rm [Ω] L1[µH] L2 [µH] Lm [H]

0.0245 0.02 1050 100 71 0.29 y1 (k + 1) = I 1 (k + 1) − I 1 (k − 1) (7)

 σ1 and σ2 are standard deviations of the measurement
 V1 (k ) − V2 (k ) 
  errors at primary and secondary side of the transformer
I 1 (k ) respectively.
x1 (k + 1) =   (8)
 I 2 (k + 1) − I 2 (k − 1) The discretised form of KVL for the middle branch of
 
 I 2 (k )  the equivalent circuit at k th time step can be written as:
The first estimated output is driven as (9): I1 (k ) + I 2 (k ) − I1 (k − 2) − I 2 (k − 2) =
(16)
yˆ1 ( k + 1) = x1 ( k + 1) θˆ 1 ( k )
T
(9) ( )
θ 21 Eˆ m (k ) − Eˆ m (k − 2) + θ 22 Eˆ m (k − 1)

where:

θˆ11 ( k )  y 2 ( k ) = I 1 ( k ) + I 2 ( k ) − I 1 ( k − 2) − I 2 ( k − 2) (17)
ˆ 
ˆθ ( k ) = θ 12 ( k )  (10)
1
θˆ ( k ) 
 13 
ˆ
θ 14 ( k )  Vˆ ( k ) − Vˆm (k − 2) 
x 2 (k ) =  m  (18)
 Vˆm ( k ) 
By reverse solving of estimation vector, the estimated
values of the transformer parameters except for Rm and Lm The next estimated output is given by (19):
are obtained as follows:
yˆ 2 (k + 1) = x 2 ( k + 1) θˆ 2 ( k )
T
(19)
2Ts θˆ (k )
Lˆ1 ( k ) = ; Rˆ1 (k ) = − 12 (11)
θˆ (k )
11 θˆ (k ) 11

θˆ ( k ) 
2Ts ˆ θˆ ( k ) θˆ 2 ( k ) =  21  (20)
Lˆ 2 ( k ) = θ13 ( k ) ; Rˆ 2 ( k ) = 14 (12) ˆ
ˆ
θ (k ) θˆ ( k ) θ 22 ( k ) 
11 11

In order to extract the values of Rm and Lm, the value of Again by reverse solving of the estimation vector; the
Em in the equivalent circuit of Fig. 2 is required where it estimated values of Rm and Lm can be obtained as follows:
cannot be determined via direct measurement. Therefore,
a state observer is used for this purpose. The observer can 2Ts 1
Lˆm (k ) = ; Rˆ m (k ) = (21)
be structured from the estimated values, obtained from the θˆ22 (k ) θˆ21 (k )
previous time step by (11) and (12).
The value of Em may be estimated from the primary Finally, an appropriate forgetting function, as described
loop of the equivalent circuit as follows: in the following section, is defined to fade out the effect of
the previous values.

Eˆ m '(k ) = V1 ( k ) − Rˆ1 (k ) I1 (k ) V. EXTENDED RLS AND FORGETTING FACTORS

1 ˆ (13) Input noise and disturbances may penetrate the
− L1 ( k ) ( I1 ( k + 1) − I1 (k − 1) )
2Ts estimation routing during data acquisition. On the other
hand, estimation routines show high sensitivity to the
A similar equation may be extracted from the noise level. Therefore, the noise level can be considered
secondary loop of the equivalent circuit: as major problems for online estimation. A high signal to
noise ratio is required for a successful convergence of an
Eˆ m″ (k ) = V2 (k ) − Rˆ2 (k ) I 2 (k ) estimation mechanism. In practice, high efficiency band
1 ˆ (14) pass filters are required in order to block the noise
− L2 (k ) ( I 2 (k + 1) − I 2 (k − 1) )
2Ts penetration into estimation routine. In the meantime,
software digital filtering may be used for this purpose
Using (13) and (14), Em at k th time step is estimated as:
.Then the white input noise is converted into colored
noise, where it may introduce a dc bias on the estimated
Eˆ m′ (k ) Eˆ m′′ (k ) parameters. An extended RLS routine can be used to solve
+
σ 2
σ 22 this problem. For this purpose, some additional
Eˆm (k ) = 1
(15)
1 1 parameters are added to the parameter vector Θ. At the
+
σ 12 σ 22 same time, the estimations errors from the previous steps
are inserted to the data vector x as given by (22).
 As described earlier, the simulation results from the
[ x RLS (k )]  equivalent circuit of a 2400/240 V, 15kVA transformer is
 
ε (k )  used as the representative of direct measurement result of
x ERLS ( k ) =  (22)
 ε (k − 1)  an actual transformer. The simulation is carried out in
  PSCAD-4 environment and fed into the estimation routine
 ..... 
which is programmed on MATLAB- 6.5. The
In order to fade out the effect of the previous values, a corresponding results are summarized in Table 2.
function so called forgetting factor 0 <λ ( k )≤1 is defined as
follows [7]: TABLE II. ESTIMATION RESULTS

  kTs  
Parameter L1 [µH] L2 [µH] Lm [H]
λ ( k ) = (1 − σ )1 − exp −  + σ
 (23)

  τ f  Real value 100 71 0.29

Where τf is forgetting time constant and σ is a value Estimated value 107.43 63.387 0.2902
between zero and unit. Therefore, the new form of (2) is Error percentage 7.434 -10.7228 0.0576
written as follows:

P (k )  x( k + 1)xT (k + 1) P(k ) 
Parameter R1 [Ω] R2 [Ω] Rm [Ω]
P(k + 1) = I np − λ (k ) + xT (k + 1)P( k )x(k + 1)  (24)
λ (k )   Real value 0.0245 0.02 1050

Another forgetting factor could be used to trace the
gradual variations of the system parameters. In this case
forgetting factor would be simply a number close to one
like 0.99, or a function as:
− k fη f (k )
λ ( k ) = σ + (1 − σ ) e
where:
ηf (k ) = (Lˆm (k ) − Lˆm (k − 1))2
This factor is not used in this work. Initial value for
covariance matrix P is taken as:
P (0) = rI np ; r >> 1
The main method which is normally used to stabilize
the estimation routine is to determine the covariance
matrix as a positive definite matrix. This can be defined as
the multiplication of two matrices as (28):
P(k ) = S (k )S T (k )
Compared to other existing estimation routines, such as
Givens routine [7] the U.D. Bierman algorithm needs less
computation time. Therefore, this is selected as an
appropriate estimation routine in this work.
VI. ESTIMATION RESULTS
In practice, an actual transformer can be used to gather
exact values of currents and voltages by online sampling.
In this work, the equivalent circuit of a 2400/240 V,
15kVA transformer is used for this purpose.
Estimated value 0.0245 0.0194 1046.4
Error percentage 2.9457e-4 -3.2074 -0.3425
Sampling intervals is taken as short as 10 [µSec].
Today, such fast sampling rate is quite practical in analog
(25)
to digital converters and DSP processors. In the
meantime, longer time intervals were examined
successfully. Forgetting factor time constant is assumed to
be about 0.001 second. Noise effect is incorporated by
(26) adding a random number to the original information. It is
also assumed that the sampling devices is equipped with
an appropriate band pass filters to eliminate noise and
unwanted information in the working frequency regions.
Figures 2 to 9 illustrate the convergence procedure of the
estimated parameters.
(27)
VII. CONCLUSION
It was shown that RELS method can be used to
estimate the dynamic equivalent circuit parameters of a
transformer at its actual operating point. The proposed
routine needs only four terminal variables of the
(28) transformer which can be easily sampled in any actual
transformer; no external excitation signals and/or no
initial information are required. Since the actual sampled
data is directly fed to the routine no variable conversion
such as reference frame conversion is needed. In this
work, the simulation results from PSCAD were
substituted as the representative of sampled data from an
actual transformer. Using the current data along with the
data from the previous steps, a so called “cost function”
was defined. In the mean time, a forgetting factor was
used to fade out the effect of previously acquired data.
The proposed estimation algorithm can be used to trace
any gradual variation of the parameters It is also capable
 -4
x 10
0.15 4

Estimated value Estimated value

0.1
Real value
2
0.05

Lh1
Rh1

-0.05

-0.1
-2
Real value
-0.15

-0.2 -4
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Iterations Iterations

Figure 4. Convergence procedure of the R̂1 Figure 7. Convergence procedure of the L̂1

-4
x 10
2000 4

Estimated value
1800
Real value Real value
2
1600

1400
Rhm

Lh2
0

1200

1000
Estimated value
-2

800

600 -4
0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180 0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
Iterations Iterations
Figure 5. Convergence procedure of the R̂2 Figure 8. Convergence procedure of the L̂2

0.15 0.45

Estimated value Estimated value

0.1 0.4
Real value Real value
0.35
0.05

0.3
0
Lhm
Rh2

0.25
-0.05
0.2

-0.1
0.15

-0.15 0.1

-0.2 0.05
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140 160 180
Iterations Iterations
Figure 6. Convergence procedure of the Rˆm Figure 9. Convergence procedure of the Lˆm

to include the effects of unbalancing, nonlinearity,
saturation, and harmonic effects of the transformer. The
procedure showed a fast and successful convergence in
the estimation of required parameters.
VIII. REFRENCES
[1] M. Sabahi, P. Karimifard, G. Gharehpetian, ‘‘RLS Method
Estimation of the Transformer Transient Parameters by Using of
Power System Transient Disturbances” ,13th Iranian Conference
on Electrical Engineering, Univesity of Zanjan, May 2005
[2] M.H. Nazemi, G.B. Gharehpetian, M. Shafiee, A. R. Allami,
“Transformation of Detailed Model Transformer Winding to it’s
Terminal Model” , ISH 2003, Delft, Netherlands, August 2003.
[3] R.C. Degeneff, “A General Method for Determining Resonance in
Transformer Winding’‘ IEEE Trans. on Power App. and Sys.,
Vol. PAS-96, No.2, March/Apr,1977, pp.423-430
[4] J. Christian. K.Feser, Usundermann and T. Leibfried, “Diagnostics
of Power Transformers by Using the Transfer Function Method”,
11,th International Symposium on High Voltage Engineering,
London, England, 22-27 August 1999 ,Vol.I, No.467, pp.37-40
[5] S. H. Thilagar, G. S. Rao, “Parameter Estimation of Three-
Winding Transformers Using Genetic Algorithm”, Elsevier
Science Ltd. , Engineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence,
2002, pp. 429-437
[6] Manitoba HVDC research center Inc., “PSCAD/EMTDC Version
4,” 2003
[7] P. E. Wellstead, M.B. Zarrop, “Self tuning systems control and
signal processing” , Wiley 1991