Interoperability Analysis Tool for IEC 61850-9-2 Standard-based Merging Units

Interoperability tests and plugfest events provide an environment to test and assure interoperability of power grid devices - to ultimately achieve equipment plug and play. However, interoperability analysis is very time-consuming and error-prone since tasks must process tens of gigabytes (GBs) of network packet data. Therefore, the challenge we face is how to efficiently analyze interoperability. To address this challenge, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has developed an interoperability analysis tool for International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) 61850-9-2 standard-based merging units (MUs). This paper introduces a software tool that can parse IEC 61850-9-2 packet data from a packet description markup language (PDML) file and automatically analyze the interoperability of IEC 61850-9-2 sampled value (SV) messages based on the IEC 61850-9-2:2011 protocol. The interoperability analysis includes data analysis of the media access control (MAC) layer, link layer, and application layer of IEC 61850-9-2 SV messages. This tool has successfully been used to analyze nineteen sets of IEC 61850-9-2 SV messages collected from both commercial physical and simulated MUs provided by seven vendors at the 2017 Utilities Communications Architecture International User Group (UCAIug) IEC 61850 Interoperability (lOP) Testing and Plugfest event.