Hardware Implementation of R-GOOSE for

Wide-Area Protection and Coordination

Jaya R. A. K. Yellajosula, Nishchal Sharma, Manikandan Sundararaman, Sumit Paudyal, and Bruce A. Mork
Michigan Technological University, Houghton, MI, USA
Emails: {jyellajo, nsharma1, msundar1, sumitp, bamork}@mtu.edu

Abstract—With the evolution of substation automation GPS

standards (IEC61850), it is possible to share protection and Process Bus for SV

from Merging units to
Bay Level
control information over wide-area network (WAN). The Instrument
Transformers
Merging
Unit
IED 1

modern microprocessor based intelligent electronic devices IED Station Bus for GOOSE
to and fro between
Ethernet
(IEDs) equipped with IEC61850 communication capability Breakers
Breaker
Controller
Switch
Substation controller
and bay level IED’s
allows implementation of wide-area protection and coordination
between different substations with the help of virtual local area Substation
Controller
network (VLAN). IEC 61850-90-1/90-5 offers detailed Ethernet
GPS Switch
guidelines on implementing VLAN based communication
between substations that would enable to transmit GOOSE Instrument Merging Ethernet
IED N
messages over WAN. In this paper, the implementation of inter Transformers Unit Switch
IED
substation coordination via routable GOOSE (R-GOOSE) is
Breaker
demonstrated and distance protection with permissive under Breakers
Controller

reaching transfer trip (PUTT) and interlocking applications

between two substations are studied. The main goal of the
study is to demonstrate basic R-GOOSE message
implementation at a laboratory level for wide-area protection
and coordination applications.
Index Terms—GOOSE Messaging, Wide-Area Protection,
Transfer Trip, IEC61850-90-1, IEC61850-8-1, IEC61850-90-5,
Permissive Under-Reaching Transfer Trip (PUTT), Wide-Area
Networks (WAN), Interlocking.
I. I NTRODUCTION
IEC 61850 has come into light in early 2000’s to address
the automation needs of the electrical substations. These
standards govern substation engineers to layout common
base for interconnecting different equipment (measuring
devices, protective relays, breakers, etc.) in a defined
communication framework [1]. In general, IEC 61850
classifies the substation into bay level, process level, and
station level, and defines two communication channels
namely process bus and station bus. Process bus collects the
measurements from CT/PT’s and communicates between bay
level devices. Similarly, the station bus collects process level
information for application server (e.g., protection, control,
display, data archiving) and communicates with bay level
devices (e.g., protective relays, bay controllers, breakers) via
logical nodes. The primary goal of these standards is to
provide an environment to integrate multi-vendor equipment
and accommodate interoperability [2], [3]. Fig. 1 provides an
overview of communication in a substation.
The IEC 61850 standard defines three main
communication messages: a) Generic Object Oriented
Substation Event (GOOSE) messages, which are status
messages with mix of analog and digital values, and are
asynchronously transmitted over station bus, b) Sampled
Process Level Bay Level Station Level
Fig. 1. Communication Framework in a Substation [13]
Values (SV), which are measurement data from the bay level
and are transmitted over to the central server via process bus.
These measurements need time-tagging with the help of
global positioning system (GPS) clock synchronization, and
c) Manufacturing Messaging Specification (MMS), which are
used for supervisory communication and remote
configuration [4], [5], [6].
Transmission system protection requires high speed
communication among the substations. IEC 61850 offers a
new set of standards under 90-1, 90-4, and 90-5, which
provide guidelines to integrate multiple substations [7], [8],
and also to transmit synchrophasor data using IEC 61850
message format [9]. These standards are crucial for
implementing wide-area protection and control. This study
presents laboratory level setup and demonstration of routable
GOOSE (R-GOOSE) over substations on different network
over virtual local area network (VLAN) with the help of
layer-3 routers [10]. In this paper, besides the R-GOOSE
setup and evaluation, the applicability of IEC61850-90-1 for
interlocking between substations and distance protection with
permissive under-reaching transfer trip (PUTT) are also
demonstrated.
Rest of the paper is organized as follows. Section II
describes the laboratory setup and VLAN settings for
R-GOOSE. Section III presents the application cases using
the R-GOOSE and validation using protective relays. Section
V provides conclusion and future work.

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 II. R-GOOSE BASICS AND L ABORATORY S ETUP B. Laboratory Setup
A. R-GOOSE Basics As discussed in the earlier section, the lab setup is mainly
based on using a layer-3 router which is configured with
IEC 61850-8-1 defines GOOSE as a multicast message VLAN and specific VLAN Id’s are assigned to substation
that is intended to be used only within a substation and does level switches. Below are the steps followed during the lab
not provide any structural recommendations to transmit over setup.
a wide-area network. In network topology terms, GOOSE is
1) Fig. 3 provides a detailed overview of lab setup for the
a layer-2 messaging service and to transmit this over WAN,
proposed configuration. Here, DOBLE F6150SV
layer-3 routers are required to be used and configured with
simulator is sued to provide voltage and current
specific VLAN Id’s to the ethernet ports [8]. This paper uses
measurements to the relays. SEL 411L relays are
the methodology of utilizing VLAN capabilities and layer-3
configured to publish and subscribe the GOOSE
router to route the GOOSE over wide-area network. The
messages. Rugged-com layer 2 switches (RSG2100)
router converts the GOOSE into a routable IP packets and
are used to create two different networks that represent
transports to the destination address. IEC61850-90-5, which
two substations. Finally, CISCO SG300-28 layer-3
was released in 2011, offers additional support in terms of
router is used to configure the VLAN and acts as
higher security, ability to send synchrophasor data, and a
medium to route/allow the GOOSE packets between
defined encryption apart from layer-3 routing into WAN [9].
The advantage of choosing VLAN is that the central the substations.
application server can listen to specific GOOSE packet based
on the VLAN identification, this would reduce the network
traffic as GOOSE message are multicast services and there is R-GOOSE R-GOOSE
no need of controller/relay to subscribe to every GOOSE CISCO SG 300-28 Layer 3 Router
Substation 1 Substation 2
message. Therefore, it is helpful to put GOOSE messages
into controllable network segments through the use of
VLANs. This creates multiple logical LANs that selectively LAN A LAN B

include various specific paths or parts of the full local and

wide-area networking arrangement. In this paper, each
GOOSE Message GOOSE Message
protective relay has a unique VLAN identification. Fig. 2 to Zone2 Trip Ruggedcom to Zone2 Trip
provides a hierarchical framework for GOOSE via VLAN in RSG 2100

WAN. Even-though routing goose messages over VLAN

offers inter substation communication without bringing every
substation on same network, there is a need of thorough
review and optimize the shortest route for time critical
V&I Measurements V&I Measurements
messages such as emergency control. Latency is also an
important area to consider while implementing this
configuration on protection algorithms which need time
tagged data.

DOBLE
VLAN Between F6150SV
Substations Control
Center
IP Communication
Substation 3...n Fig. 3. Laboratory Setup at Michigan Tech to demonstrate the application
GOOSE Messages
using R-GOOSE.

2) Fig. 4 shows the Cisco router configuration of ports with

Layer 3
Substation 1 Router Substation 2 specific VLAN Id. This VLAN ID is assigned to rugged-
Substation 2 com switches. By doing so, the Cisco router would allow
Layer 2 Layer 2
the routable IP packets.
Switch Switch 3) Fig. 5 shows the configuration of VLAN for Rugged-
Substation Substation Substation Substation
Controller_1 Controller_2 Controller_1 Controller_2
com switches, these switches will handle the respective
IED s
GOOSE messages and route to WAN.
with IEC 4) With this basic setup, pinging is carried out and delay
61850
of less than 4ms is observed. A sample test GOOSE
message is published and subscribed between two
Fig. 2. VLAN based R-GOOSE Setup in WAN. stations to check the quality of the message.

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Fig. 4. Layer 3 Router configuration to allow Specific VLAN Id.
Fig. 5. Rugged-com switch configuration for VLAN.
III. A PPLICATIONS OF R-GOOSE
A. Interlocking
Interlocking is a method of closing breakers at two ends of
a transmission line, which is performed after synchronization
check. This process requires an acknowledge from the remote
end breaker, before closing the local breaker. In this paper,
the basic interlocking scheme is explored and it assumes that
synchronization check was already performed and also a logic
for interlocking is designed as per [7]. Fig. 6 presents the basic
schematic that was simulated on the lab setup.
setup sends digital inputs between the substations, which
certifies the setup is working without data loss.
In this case, substation A sends a breaker close latch to
substation B. Once the close acknowledgement is received
from substation B, then Breaker A is closed. There is a
delay of 10 ms on breaker A, which is configured to make
sure that the breaker A should wait for acknowledgement
from Breaker B. As per [7], this operation should be
performed within 100 ms, and with the proposed setup the
operation is performed within 4ms.
B. Distance Protection with PUTT
In order to reduce the fault clearing time, it is imperative
to isolate the faulty line completely from the system. When
there is a fault on the transmission line, it is not enough just
to trip the breaker at local end of the line but to trip the
breaker at remote end of the line. In distance protection,
accelerated transfer trip schemes such as permissive under
reaching transfer trip (PUTT) and permissive over reaching
transfer trips (POTT) are implemented using a dedicated
communication channel such as power line carrier
communication (PLCC). The use of these schemes is to
achieve the shortest fault clearing time. However, in order to
minimize the fault isolation time, we are adopting IEC
61850 based R-GOOSE [14].
PUTT scheme is the one when a Zone-1 element of the local
distance relay picks up because of the fault, the trip signal
will be communicated to the remote end. This trip signal is
further validated with the Zone-2 pick-up of the remote end
distance relay as shown in Fig 7. When the both the values
are true, the breaker at the remote end of the line will be
tripped. POTT scheme is similar to PUTT scheme except that
it uses the overreaching Zone-2 element of the distance relay
for Transfer Trip. Further, in POTT scheme there is a need if
directional relay to confirm the relay only trips for the faults
when it is within its protected zone.
Trip signal to
Remote end

Zone 1
Substation_A Substation_B
Bus_A Breaker_A Bus_B
Breaker_B
Zone 2 Delay for Zone 2
Trip
GOOSE_LAN_A Layer 3 Router GOOSE_LAN_B breaker
RSG 2100 Cisco SG300-28 RSG 2100
Close_A Tx Tx Zone 3 Delay for Zone 3
Rx Rx

AND Trip signal from

10 ms Close_B
Remote end

SEL 411L SEL 411L

Fig. 7. Permissive under reaching transfer trip.

Fig. 6. Interlocking schematic. In the lab setup as discussed in Fig 8, a PUTT scheme has
been implemented using two SEL 411L distance relays and
The main goal of this case study is to ensure that the R-GOOSE. For each relay, functionally constrained data
communication link between two substations is up and this attribute of PDIS nodes (dedicated logical nodes for distance

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protection) were used in the R-GOOSE messages sent to the
remote end substation. The R-GOOSE in this case provides a
faster communication passage as the bandwidth of the
communication channel is much higher than a PLCC (100
Mpbs vs 112 kpbs). In addition, as the GOOSE messages
will be sent through a different VLAN the communication
inherently much secure than a PLCC [1]. Because of the
multicast nature of the GOOSE signal, it makes the
communication channel much more reliable. The reliability
can be further improved by using redundant communication
channels. [12] provides a basic implementation of GOOSE
based distance protection, where as in this paper we have
studied distance protection with R-GOOSE in a
inter-substation setup.

Substation_A Z1 (Sec) = 24∠80° Ω & Z0 (Sec) = 72∠80° Ω Substation_B

GOOSE_LAN_A Layer 3 Router GOOSE_LAN_B

RSG 2100 Cisco SG300-28 RSG 2100
PUTT Tx Tx PUTT
Rx Rx Fig. 9. Distance relay settings

& TRIP Breaker TRIP Breaker &

SEL 411L SEL 411L

Fig. 8. Setup for distance protection with PUTT.

Fig. 9 shows the impedance boundaries for zone-1 and 2.

Zone-1 protects 80% of the line. Fig. 10 provides an
overview relay IP configurations and dataset configurations
used for this application, here there PDIS elements are
visible in the configuration settings.
IV. C ONCLUSION AND F UTURE S COPE
In this paper, hardware setup of VLAN based R-GOOSE is
Fig. 10. Relay’s GOOSE Configuration.
established and two of applications were studied. Interlocking
is studied to check the effectiveness of the communication
channel. Distance protection with PUTT is then studied, as
this is one of the important transmission line protection which synchrophasor values as per IEC 61850-90-5 are in progress.
require measurements from local and remote substations, and In conclusion, this paper is aimed to put forward the initial
is also highly time-critical application. setup towards a WAN substation automation system to work
Even though IEC 61850 does not offer a detailed with protection and control and controlled remedial action
procedure to implement inter-substation communication, services.
there are few pointers mentioned in IEC 61850-90-1,90-4 R EFERENCES
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