Approach to fitting parameters and clustering for characterising measured voltage dips based on two-dimensional polarisation ellipses

© The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2017. An alternative approach to characterise real voltage dips is proposed and evaluated in this study. The proposed methodology is based on voltage-space vector solutions, identifying parameters for ellipses trajectories by using the leastsquares algorithm applied on a sliding window along the disturbance. The most likely patterns are then estimated through a clustering process based on the k-means algorithm. The objective is to offer an efficient and easily implemented alternative to characterise faults and visualise the most likely instantaneous phase-voltage evolution during events through their corresponding voltage-space vector trajectories. This novel solution minimises the data to be stored but maintains extensive information about the dips including starting and ending transients. The proposed methodology has been applied satisfactorily to real voltage dips obtained from intensive field-measurement campaigns carried out in a Spanish wind power plant up to a time period of several years. A comparison to traditional minimum root mean square-voltage and time-duration classifications is also included in this study.