Representing Synchrophasor Data Using JSON

Synchrophasor technology offers myriad possibilities in terms of novel operation, control and analysis of electrical power system infrastructure. Unfortunately, accessing synchrophasor data is complicated by data markup standards and transport protocols. This paper presents an alternative approach which is built on trusted methodologies and techniques used in data science, and proposes that the widely used JSON format is used for synchrophasor data encapsulation. The structure described has been deployed in a University lab for several years, it facilitates various live analysis and presentation methods, as-well-as data archival. An advantage of the text based JSON format is that it can be inspected by researchers directly and the data can be directly loaded into virtually all analysis software. An agreed data structure streamlines collaboration, exchange of research and replication of results in a development environment. The schema can also be used for compression, security and rejecting bad data in a production environment. Tools for handling JSON data are readily available and are commercially tested as JSON is so widely used.