The 48th annual Western Protective Relay Conference was scheduled for 18 – 21 October 2021 at the Spokane Convention Center in Spokane, Washington, USA. However, due to continuing COVID-19 pandemic the 2021 conference organized by Washington State University was held again virtually.
The conference is a forum that allows participants to learn and apply advanced technologies that prevent electrical power failures. One of the benefits of the virtual format is that because there is no travel it attracted participants not only from the United States and North America, but also from other countries from around the world. The participants had access to all sessions, but an additional benefit was the ability to have digital access to the conference presentations and papers after the event.
The 2021 program was focused on the latest developments in power system protection and control technologies and their applications in the field. The papers were presented in 10 paper sessions running in parallel with 10 fundamentals sessions. The papers covered a wide range of topics such as line and transformer protection, communications and cyber security, renewable energy resources with inverter-based interfaces to the grid. IEC 61850 and its latest applications in digital substations were also discussed, together with modeling and testing topics.
The conference also included exhibitor sessions where companies displayed their products and services.