Observers for Differential Algebraic Equation Models of Power Networks: Jointly Estimating Dynamic and Algebraic States

Phasor measurement units (PMUs) have become instrumental in modern power systems for enabling real time, wide-area monitoring and control. Accordingly, many studies have investigated efficient and robust dynamic state estimation (DSE) methods in order to accurately compute the dynamic states of generation units. Nonetheless, most of them forego the dynamic-algebraic nature of power networks and only consider their nonlinear dynamic representations. Motivated by the lack of DSE methods based on power network’s differential-algebraic equations (DAEs), this article develops a novel observer-based DSE framework in order to perform simultaneous estimation of the dynamic and algebraic states of multimachine power networks. Specifically, we leverage the DAE dynamics of a power network around an operating point and combine them with a PMU-based measurement model capable of capturing bus voltages and line currents. The proposed $\mathcal {H}_{\infty }$ observer, which only requires detectability and impulse observability conditions that are satisfied for various power networks, is designed to handle various noise, unknown inputs, and input sensor failures. The results obtained from performing extensive numerical simulations on IEEE 9-bus and 39-bus systems showcase the effectiveness of the proposed approach for DSE purposes.