Power Disturbances Classification Using S-Transform Based GA–PNN

Abstract

The significance of detection and classification of power quality events that disturb the voltage and/or current waveforms in the electrical power distribution networks is well known. Consequently, in spite of a large number of research reports in this area, a research on the selection of proper parameter for specific classifiers was so far not explored. The parameter selection is very important for successful modelling of input–output relationship in a function approximation model. In this study, probabilistic neural network (PNN) has been used as a function approximation tool for power disturbance classification and genetic algorithm (GA) is utilised for optimisation of the smoothing parameter of the PNN. The important features extracted from raw power disturbance signal using S-Transform are given to the PNN for effective classification. The choice of smoothing parameter for PNN classifier will significantly impact the classification accuracy. Hence, GA based parameter optimization is done to ensure good classification accuracy by selecting suitable parameter of the PNN classifier. Testing results show that the proposed S-Transform based GA–PNN model has better classification ability than classifiers based on conventional grid search method for parameter selection. The noisy and practical signals are considered for the classification process to show the effectiveness of the proposed method in comparison with existing methods.