Indices for Assessing Harmonic Distortion from Power Quality Measurements:

Definitions and Benchmark Data

D. Daniel Sabin

Daniel L. Brooks

Ashok Sundaram

Member, IEEE
dsabin@electrotek.com

Member, IEEE
dbrooks@electrotek.com

Member, IEEE
asundara@epri.com

Electrotek Concepts, Inc.

Knoxville, Tennessee, USA
Abstract: For many years, electricity distribution companies have
used sustained interruption indices as indicators of the reliability of
service provided on their systems.
Today, however, many
electricity consumers are adversely affected by more subtle voltage
disturbances such as harmonic distortion. In response to the
increased sensitivity of end-use equipment, many utilities are
implementing extensive monitoring systems to assess service
quality levels. Such monitoring systems yield massive databases of
service quality data. This paper presents indices developed to
quantify system service quality with respect to measured harmonic
distortion levels. Example benchmark values for the indices are
calculated using data from a national distribution power quality
data collection project.
Keywords: power quality, harmonic distortion, power system
monitoring, statistical databases, power system harmonics

I. INTRODUCTION
Harmonic distortion has existed on electric power systems
for many years. Recently, however, electric utilities have
designated more resources to monitoring and analyzing the
presence and effects of distortion on system and customer
devices. This increased awareness is the result of concerns
that harmonic distortion levels may be increasing on many
electric power systems [10, 11]. There are two factors
contributing greatly to this concern. The first is the
increased application of utility and industrial capacitors to
increase the utilization of existing distribution system
infrastructures. The second concern is the increasing size
and application of nonlinear devices, which produce the
majority of harmonic distortion on distribution systems.
The percentage of electric power that passes through
power electronic devices is increasing because of the

Electric Power Research Institute

Palo Alto, California, USA
additional energy efficiencies and flexibility that they offer.
Power electronic devices present a two-fold problem with
regard to harmonics. Not only do they produce harmonics,
but they also are typically more sensitive to the resulting
distortion than more traditional power system devices.
Consequently, customer expectations of the level of service
provided rise with the number of distorting devices being
utilized.
As a result of these and other quality concerns, a greater
emphasis is being placed on the quality of service provided
to customers. A significant number of utilities have begun to
apply extensive service quality monitoring systems
throughout their distribution systems in order to determine
the typical level of service quality provided. Whether
assessing the aggregate system service quality or an
individual customer service quality, utilities must
meaningfully quantify the raw measured data. In the past
utilities have assessed service quality using sustained
interruption indices such as SAIFI and CAIDI. The
increasing number of power electronic devices and other
sensitive end-use equipment, however, results in a need for
indices that quantify more subtle areas of service quality
such as harmonic distortion.
II. SAMPLING TECHNIQUES
In order to assess harmonic distortion, many electric
utilities employ power quality monitoring instruments that
record periodic samples. Power quality engineers configure
these instruments to record a sample of voltage and current
for each of the three phases and the neutral. The monitors
make recordings at regular intervals of time (for example,
every thirty minutes). Typically, the measurements consist
of a single cycle (Fig. 1). The power quality monitors may
record thousands of measurements that need to be efficiently
summarized. The recorded waveforms yield information
about many steady-state characteristics, including harmonic
distortion, phase unbalance, power factor, form factor, and
crest factor. This paper will focus upon the analysis of these
waveforms for harmonic content.
Because of its periodic nature, harmonic distortion can be
analyzed by using Fourier analysis.
The numerical
technique of computing the magnitude and phase angle for

VTHD =

V h2
h= 2

(1)

V1

Limitations of the useful of THD have been identified for

situations where no fundamental component exists [3].
While this should be noted, most applications of the indices
presented here are at the primary distribution level or
customer service entrance where this concern is typically
unfounded.
The variance of harmonic distortion follows daily, weekly,
and seasonal patterns. An example of daily patterns of
harmonic distortion appears in Fig. 3. It demonstrates how
THD often follows a daily cyclical pattern. We recorded
these measurements from phase A at a 13.2 kV distribution
substation supplying a residential load. When nonlinear
loads are high relative to the amount of linear load in a
system, THD is relatively high. For a residential feeder, this
condition frequently occurs at night and during the early
morning hours.
A useful method of summarizing a time series of numbers
is by creating a histogram, as shown in Fig. 4. This graph
shows data collected for one month from the same substation
site featured in Fig. 3. Two distinct peaks are visible in the
distribution, presenting an example of the sometimes
bimodal nature of harmonic distortion.

3.0
2.5

The height of the fundamental

(60 Hz) component is 100% by
definition.

2.0
1.5
1.0
0.5

30

28

26

24

22

20

18

16

14

12

10

0.0
0

To summarize the many single-cycle measurements, it

becomes necessary to use indices. Basic distortion analysis
defines one particularly useful index in normalizing the total
voltage harmonic content by the fundamental frequency
component.
This value is called the total harmonic
distortion (THD) of the voltage. The definition of THD is
presented by (1).

Steady-State Voltage Sample in the Frequency Domain

Voltage (% of V 1)

each harmonic of a waveform is known as a Fast Fourier

Transform (FFT). Different algorithms for performing the
FFT exist, but most operate by inputting time domain data
(Fig. 1) and outputting data in the frequency domain (Fig.
2). Note that we have normalized the harmonic components
in Fig. 2 by the fundamental voltage component, V1.

Frequency (Harmonics of 60 Hz)

Fig.2. Steady-State Voltage Waveform in the Frequency Domain

distribution is cumulative frequency.

The cumulative
frequency values are overlaid as a curve in Fig. 3. In Fig. 4,
the cumulative frequency curve has been isolated from the
columns of the histogram for clarification. We have also
demonstrated how to graphically compute the 95th percentile
value of the example distribution. Also known as the CP95,
this is the value that is larger than 95% of all other samples
in the distribution. The CP95 is frequently more valuable
than the maximum value of a distribution because it is less
sensitive to spurious measurements. For the distribution in
Fig. 4, the CP95 value of the voltage THD was 3.17%. We
can estimate the value by drawing intersecting lines on the
graph, or we can calculate it by using a statistical analysis
program.
Usually an electric utility will collect measurements at
more than one location. It then becomes possible to create a
histogram similar to Fig. 4 for each monitoring site. A
different CP95 value can be computed for each monitoring
location. If many sites are monitored, then it becomes useful
to make a histogram of these CP95 values themselves.
Where Fig. 4 presented the variance of the distortion at a
single site for different observations in time, the new
histogram can present the variable from different
measurement sites. Fig. 6 presents an example of such a
histogram, which serves to summarize the measurements
Trend of V THD
4%

An important computation that we can make from a

3%

VTHD

Steady-State Voltage Sample in the Time Domain

15000
Voltage (V)

10000

2%

5000
0

1%

-5000
-10000
-15000
0

10
Time (ms)

15

Fig.1. Steady-State Voltage Waveform in the Time Domain

20

0%
5/1/95

5/3/95

5/5/95

5/7/95

5/9/95

Fig. 3. Trend of Voltage Total Harmonic Distortion Demonstrating Daily

Cycle for One Week

Histogram of VTHD CP95

2
1
5.2%

4.8%

4.4%

4.0%

3.6%

3.2%

2.8%

0.0%

VTHD

2.4%

4.0%

3.6%

3.2%

2.8%

2.4%

2.0%

1.6%

1.2%

0.8%

0.4%

0.0%

2.0%

50

1.6%

100

1.2%

150

0.8%

200

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
0.4%

250

Count of Sites

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%

Cumulative Frequency

Count of Samples

300

Cumulative Frequency

Histogram of VTHD

VTHD

Fig. 4. Histogram of Voltage Total Harmonic Distortion for One Month

Demonstrating Bimodal Distribution

Fig. 6. Histogram of CP95 Value for Voltage THD at 54 Monitoring Sites

both temporally and spatially. From this we can also

graphically determine a CP95 value. This CP95 value can
be thought of as a statistic of a statistic. Because utility
budgets limit the number of monitoring locations, the
number of samples in the temporal-spatial distribution will
usually be less than the number of samples in the temporal
distribution. The number of samples in the temporal
distribution is limited only by the number of weeks or
months that an instrument is installed.

a three-phase measurement which has varying distortion

levels on each phase.

III. CHARACTERIZATION OF 3-PHASE HARMONIC

VOLTAGE MEASUREMENTS
Many distribution system loads are served from a single
phase. As a result, the harmonic content of each primary
phase voltage differs. The difference in phase harmonic
content can be significant, as is often true when monitoring
at the point-of-common-coupling between the utility and a
single customer. The problem in characterizing such
harmonic data is how to represent the harmonic distortion of

100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
4.0%

3.6%

3.2%

2.8%

2.4%

2.0%

1.6%

1.2%

0.8%

0.4%

0.0%

CP95 = 3.17%

Cumulative Frequency

Histogram of VTHD

VTHD
Fig. 5. Demonstration of Graphical Method of Calculating the CP95 of a
Distribution

There are two possible methods for characterizing threephase harmonic measurements. The first method is to
consider the distortion levels on each phase to be individual
measurements. Thus, we treat the distortion levels on each
phase separately.
A single three-phase harmonic
measurement contributes three separate distortion levels to
the distribution of sampled harmonic measurements. The
problem with this method is that a count of how often
distortion levels exceed a specified level is potentially three
times too large.
The second method for characterizing three-phase
harmonic measurements is to average the distortion levels on
the three phases. As a result, each three-phase steady-state
measurement contributes a single distortion level to the
distribution of harmonic distortion samples. There is the
possibility that the significance of high distortion levels on a
single phase is reduced by the other two phases which might
exhibit lower distortion levels. Nonetheless, we designate
this method of averaging the individual phase distortion
levels for calculating the harmonic distortion indices
presented.
IV. DEFINTION OF HARMONIC INDICES
We have developed the harmonic distortion indices to aid
in the assessment of service quality for a specified circuit
The indices were defined such that they may be applied to
systems of varying size. For example, the indices may be
applied to measurements recorded across a utilitys entire
distribution system resulting in system averages, or the
indices may be applied to a smaller segment of the
distribution system, such as a single feeder or a single
customer point-of-common-coupling (PCC). A system index
value serves as a metric only and is not intended as an exact
representation of the quality of service provided to each

individual customer served from the assessed system.

However, system index values can be used as a benchmark
against which index values for various parts of the
distribution system can be compared.
System Total Harmonic Distortion CP95 (STHD95).
STHD95 represents CP95 value of a weighted distribution of
the individual circuit segment THD distribution CP95
values. Consider a distribution of THD samples collected
over a monitoring period for each circuit segment
comprising the assessed system. A CP95 value can be
calculated for each of the individual circuit segment THD
distributions (Fig. 4). Collectively, these individual circuit
segment CP95 THD values comprise a system distribution of
segment THD CP95 values (Fig. 5). STHD95 is the CP95 of
this system segment distribution. STHD95 is defined by (2)
and (3).
STHD 95

f (CP95
t

= 0.95

SATHD =

L
s =1

( CP95 s ) Ls

f (x )
s

MEANTHDs

= 0.95

(4)

LT

N mw

MEANTHDs =

f (x )

(2)

CP95s

System Average Total Harmonic Distortion (SATHD).

SATHD is based on the mean value of the distribution of
voltage THD measurements recorded for each circuit
segment rather than the CP95 value. SATHD represents the
weighted average voltage THD experienced over the
monitoring period normalized by the total connected kVA
served from the assessed system. SATHD is defined by (4)
and (5).

) Ls

exceeded for more than one hour per day which is

approximately 4% of the time [1]. Thus, the SATHD95
value of a representative distribution is related to the
allowable duration limits of excessive THD values expressed
in the IEEE standard.

(3)

where
s circuit segment number
xi steady-state THD measurement number i
Ls connected kVA served from circuit segment s
fs(xi ) probability distribution function comprised of
sampled THD values for circuit segment s
CP95s 95th % cumulative probability value; it is a
statistical quantity representing the value of THD
which is larger than exactly 95% of the samples
comprising the THD distribution for segment s
ft(CP95s) probability distribution function comprised of
the individual circuit segment THD CP95 values
Unlike the response of equipment to a transient
disturbance where a disruption of less than a cycle in
duration can cause process shutdowns or equipment damage,
equipment disruptions due to harmonics typically are the
result of continued distortion over some duration of time.
High THD levels that decrease after a relatively short
duration may not affect customer or utility equipment
adversely. The CP95 value of a distribution of THD values
is a measure which neglects the highest distortion samples.
Thus, 5% of the samples can be exceedingly high, as might
be the case for a circuit exhibiting short-duration harmonic
increases, without significantly affecting the index value.
IEEE Standard 519 specifies that THD limits are not to be

THD

i =1

(5)

N MW

where
s circuit segment number
k total number of circuit segments in the system being
assessed
Ls connected kVA served from circuit segment s
LT total connected kVA served from the system being
assessed
i steady-state measurement number
THDi voltage total harmonic distortion calculated for
measurement window i
NMW total number of steady-state measurement
windows collected for a given circuit segment over
the duration of the monitoring period
MEANTHDs statistical mean of the THD values
obtained from each of the steady-state measurement
windows for circuit segment s
This index actually reflects two averages. SATHD
summarizes the THD measurements recorded over time by
multiple monitors. In order to represent the average both
spatially and temporally, SATHD is the mean value of the
individual site mean THD values.
Note that each of the harmonic distortion indices
presented are weighted by connected kVA.
When
calculating system indices, multipliers are used to give more
weight to data from monitoring sites deemed more
important. This weighting may be related to the number of
customers served from the area the monitor data represents,
the amount of load served from the area, sensitivity of
customer loads, etc. Connected load is specified as the
weighting factor for the indices defined here. This is similar

to weighting methods specified in IEC Standard 1000-3-6,

Assessment of Emission Limits for Distorting Loads in MV
and HV Power Systems [6]. This standard specifies
distortion limits based on power quantities. Other weighting
factors could easily be used.
We can easily compute frequency of occurrence indices for
disturbance phenomena. Because disturbance data are
triggered measurements, the power quality instrumentation
records each occurrence of the specified event as a unique
measurement. The number of occurrences is then simply
normalized by the time interval over which the
measurements were recorded.
It is more difficult to calculate similar indices for steadystate phenomena such as harmonics. Without continuously
recording data, steady-state quantities can only be assessed
using sampled data. Based on discrete samples, the absolute
frequency of steady-state quantities exceeding specified
levels can not be determined. For example, based on a
distribution of THD samples, there is no way to know the
true amount of time that the system exceeded a certain THD
value. If the distribution of steady-state measurements is
obtained by a statistically valid sampling method, the THD
distribution should be representative of the actual system
THD variations. In such a case, an approximation of the
amount of time the system THD exceeded a certain value can
be calculated. The ratio of excessive THD samples to the
total number of samples is a good approximation. For the
harmonic distortion indices, this ratio is considered to be the
frequency of occurrence of a specified threshold THD value.
System Average Excessive Total Harmonic Distortion
Ratio Index THD Level (SAETHDRITHD). SAETHDRITHD is a
measure of the number of steady-state measurements that
exhibit a THD value exceeding the specified threshold, THD.
For each circuit segment comprising the assessed system, the
number of measurements exceeding the THD threshold is
normalized by the total number of measurements recorded
for that segment. The system average is then computed by
weighting each segment ratio by the load served from that
segment. SAETHDRITHD is defined by (7).
k

L
SAETHDRI THD =

s =1

N THD s

N MW s
LT

(7)

where
s circuit segment number
k total number of circuit segments in the system being
assessed
Ls connected kVA served from circuit segment s
LT total connected kVA served from the system being
assessed
i steady-state measurement number
THD THD threshold specified for calculation of this
index

NTHD s number of steady-state measurements (or

estimated-measurements produced by the PQSE) that
exhibit a THD value for segment s which exceeds the
specified THD threshold value, THD
NMW s total number of steady-state measurements
recorded for segment s over the assessment period
SAETHDRITHD provides a measure of the portion of the
time that the designated system exceeds a specified THD
value.
For example, we can use SATHEDRI5% to
approximate the amount of time the defined system exceeds
the IEEE Std. 519-1992 THD limit of 5%.
V. BENCHMARK DATA
A. Monitoring Project across the United States
In this section of the paper we present benchmark data for
the indices defined in Section III. We based our benchmarks
on the data from the final results for a power quality
monitoring survey of 277 measurement locations located on
the primary distribution feeder of 24 electric utilities across
the United States. The industry knows the project more
commonly as the EPRI Distribution System Power Quality
Monitoring Project, or the EPRI DPQ Project [2]. In order
to assess harmonic distortion, we used a one-cycle waveform
measured at half-hour intervals at each monitored location.
The voltage waveforms consisted of 256 samples per cycle,
while the current waveforms consisted of 128 samples per
cycle. During a twenty-one month period of the project from
6/1/93 to 3/1/95, we configured the noise floor of the
monitoring instruments to be well below the levels of
harmonic distortion encountered on the distribution feeders.
During this period, the power quality monitors collected over
five million three-phase steady-state measurements, giving
us over fifteen million waveforms upon which to base our
statistics.
B. Monitor-Limited Segmentation
Note that the calculation of the harmonic distortion
indices defined in Section III of the paper is not complete
unless we know the amount of connected kVA. We did not
have that information available to us when computing our
nationwide project results. We would have had to perform
some sort of power quality state estimation to determine the
distortion experienced by loads throughout the systems we
were monitoring. Without the added information provided
by state estimation, we would have to segment the assessed
system so that every point in the system is contained within a
section monitored by an actual power quality measuring
instrument. Thus, the number of monitoring locations
within the assessed system becomes the number of constant
voltage segments upon which we calculate the indices.
Because this process of monitor-limited segmentation (MLS)
results in only a few segments per circuit, the calculated

index values are less accurate than those calculated using

state estimation concepts. Nonetheless, MLS still yields
indices that are informative.

Average Voltage THD at Each Monitoring Site

Figure 8 presents the distribution of 95th percentile value

of voltage THD at the different sites. The average value of
CP95 value for VTHD was 2.18%. Computing the CP95 of
the data presented in the histogram gives us the System
Total Harmonic Distortion CP95 (STHD95), which was
4.03%. The larger spread of samples between 0.2% and
6.4% THD causes the wider 95% confidence interval. This
histogram also presents a number of monitoring locations
that exceeded the limits established by IEEE Std. 519-1992.
Recall that at the point of common coupling, the utility is
responsible for maintaining voltage THD below 5%. A total
of 3.3% of the sites exceeded this limit for at least 5% of
their samples. Though not shown by any graphs in this
paper, only one monitored substation representing 0.3225%
of the total study population exceeded IEEE Std. 519-1992
for more than 95% of its samples.

12%

80%
60%

10%
8%

40%

6%
4%

20%

2%
0%
6.6

6.0

5.4

4.8

4.2

3.6

3.0

2.4

1.8

1.2

0.6

0%
VTHD (%)

Fig. 7. Histogram of Average Value for Voltage THD at 277 Monitoring Sites
from 6/1/93 to 3/1/93 (Treated by Sampling Weights)

average voltage THD for each day and site of the monitoring
project. These values were in turn averaged to give us an
average value of harmonic distortion for a given site during a
month. In order to estimate the average value of voltage
THD for the entire system of monitoring locations, we
computed a simple average of the site values (that is, we did
not use the sampling weight method to compute a ratio
estimator). Thus we obtained the System Average Total
Harmonic Distortion (SATHD) index value for each of the
twenty-seven months of monitoring, allowing us to plot them
as in Fig. 9.
We can make two observations about Fig. 9. The first is
that a seasonal pattern is very evident; voltage THD tends to
be lower during the winter months and lower still during the
summer months. Though we do not have all twelve months
for 1993 and 1995, their segments nonetheless follow this
cyclical pattern. The periods of low THD correspond with
peak loading periods of the year due to heating and air
conditioning demand. If we assume that air conditioning
represents the increased load in the summer, then the results
CP95 Voltage THD at Each Monitoring Site
14%

100%
90%

12%

80%
Mean:
2.18%
CP95 (STHD95):
4.03%
Standard Deviation: 0.101%
95% Confidence Interval:
1.99% to 2.38%

10%
8%

What can we say about the seasonal effects of harmonic

distortion? To answer this question, we computed the

60%
50%

6%

40%

4%

30%
20%

2%

10%
6.6

6.0

5.4

4.8

4.2

3.6

3.0

2.4

1.8

1.2

0.6

0%
0.0

0%

D. Seasonal Effects

70%

Cumulative Frequency

We computed these statistics by using ratio estimators,

thereby taking full advantage of the sampling weights for the
monitored sites. Using ratio estimators gives us a smaller
variance than if we were to take a simple variance of the
sites. We justify the reduction because the sites selected are
representatives of many more sites, and we include these
others in the calculation.

Mean (SATHD):
1.57%
Standard Deviation: 0.0714%
95% Confidence Interval:
1.43% to 1.71%

14%

0.0

Fig. 7 presents how temporal average voltage THD is

distributed for each site. A few notes on how to interpret the
graph are necessary. We have normalized the height of each
column such that the height of all columns end-to-end is
100%. Thus we can say that the just under 18% of the
monitoring sites had an average value of voltage THD of
1.2% for the period from 6/1/93 to 3/1/95. The plot has been
treated by using the sampling weights discussed in [2];
therefore the graph does not directly represent the 277 sites
which were recording data at the time but rather is an
estimate of the entire distribution systems of the twenty-four
EPRI DPQ utilities. We have computed summary statistics
including sample mean, standard deviation, and 95%
confidence interval. A confidence interval is a range on
either side of a sample mean. It allows us to state with a
particular level of confidence the range within which we
expect the true mean of the population from which we have
sampled to be located. In this case we can say that we are
95% confident that the true mean of the study population to
be between 1.43% and 1.71%. The mean of the distribution
is the same as the System Average Total Harmonic
Distortion (SATHD) index described in Section III.

Frequency of Sites

C. System Results

Frequency of Sites

16%

Cumulative Frequency

100%

18%

VTHD (%)
Fig. 8. Histogram of CP95 Value for Voltage THD at 277 Monitoring Sites
from 6/1/93 to 3/1/93 (Treated by Sampling Weights)

systems.
The sampling technique consists of regular
sampling of voltage and current waveforms.
The
measurements are transmitted to a central database, upon
which we can perform the computations necessary to
determine harmonic distortion statistics. It should be noted
that the sampling technique described in this paper is not the
only one in use.

SATHD Index Values Computed by Month

2.0%

SATHD

1.8%
1.6%
1.4%

1995
1994
1993

1.2%

Dec

Nov

Oct

Sep

Aug

Jul

Jun

May

Apr

Mar

Feb

Jan

1.0%

Month of Project

Fig. 9. SATHD Value by Month, From 6/1/93 to 9/1/95, Unweighted, All Sites

show the damping effect provided by traditional air

conditioning load. An important note about the rise and fall
of the THD is that it is very small relative to the 5% limit
imposed by IEEE Std. 519-1992.
The second observation is related to the average value of
THD for corresponding months from one year to the next.
Although each year appears to have the same cyclical shape
when plotted on the graph, each trend is slightly higher than
the previous; there is only one line intersection. This would
suggest that during the two-year monitoring period, the
study populations voltage THD was rising.
This
observation is particularly interesting in light of the
increased concern about the proliferation of power electronic
equipment.
Considering this finding, we decided to investigate the
issue even further. As mentioned above, the average value
for each month contained all of the sites that were active
during the period of monitoring. This number was different
from month to month as monitoring instruments went in and
out of service. Therefore, it would be valuable to compare
the rise in VTHD for individual sites from year to year.
Indeed, [2] showed that there was a small trend toward
increasing VTHD during the twenty-seven month monitoring
project. On average, the projects sites showed a VTHD
increase of approximately 10% from their previous value
from 1993 to 1994. For instance, if the VTHD level was 1.0%
for a typical site during a given month in 1993, then it would
be 1.1% during the same month in 1994. The mean rise of
VTHD between a given month in 1994 and its corresponding
month in 1995 was approximately 7%.
Background
increases in harmonic distortion attributable to increasing
percentages of nonlinear loads have been predicted in
previous papers such as [10].
VI. CONCLUSIONS
This paper presents the methods used by numerous
utilities and research groups worldwide to assess the
magnitude of harmonic distortion in their power delivery

This paper presents three key indices that are being used
by a growing number of utilities to assess distortion. These
utilities are also using other indices to assess power quality
levels, including indices for voltage regulation, phase
unbalance, individual harmonic distortion, current total
demand distortion, rate and severity of voltage sags, and rate
and severity of transient overvoltages. In order to compute
system-wide index values, power quality measurements may
be combined with state estimation techniques.
The paper also presents benchmark values from a 24utility monitoring study recently performed across the United
States.
Using monitored-limited segmentation, we
calculated the System Average Total Harmonic Distortion
(SATHD) to be 1.57%, while the System Total Harmonic
Distortion CP95 (STHD95) value was 4.04%. Results from
the project demonstrated daily and seasonal patterns in
harmonic distortion. They also demonstrated a small
increase in harmonic distortion levels.
VII. REFERENCES
[1]

IEEE Std. 1159-1992 IEEE Recommended Practices and

Requirements for Harmonic Control in Electric Power Systems
(ANSI).

[2]

Electric Power Research Institute, An Assessment of Distribution

System Power Quality, Volume 2: Statistical Summary Report. Palo
Alto, EPRI TR-106294-V2, 1996.

[3]

G. Heydt and W. T. Jewell, Pitfalls of Electric Power Quality Indices,

IEEE PE-193-PWRD-0-01-1997, Presented at 1997 IEEE PES WM in
New York, New York.

[4]

E. W. Gunther and H. Mehta, A Survey of Distribution System Power

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VIII. BIOGRAPHIES
D. Daniel Sabin (M93) is a senior power
systems engineer at Electrotek Concepts in
Knoxville, Tennessee. Dan was the principal
engineer for the EPRI Distribution System
Power Quality Monitoring during its data
collection and analysis stages. In addition to
developing the projects databases, he
performed power quality event and statistical
analysis for its monthly, quarterly, and final
reports. Dan has a bachelor of science degree in
electrical
engineering
from
Worcester
Polytechnic
Institute
of
Worcester,
Massachusetts, and a master of engineering
degree in electric power from Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. He is the chair of the IEEE P1409
Custom Power Task Force.
Daniel L. Brooks (M95) is a senior power
systems engineer with Electrotek Concepts in
Knoxville, Tennessee. Daniel has the bachelor
of science and master of science degrees in
electrical engineering from Mississippi State
University. He is presently serving as principal
engineer
for
the
EPRI
Reliability
Benchmarking Methodology Project. Prior to
this project, he was actively involved in power
quality data analysis for the EPRI Distribution
Power Quality Project. Daniel is the secretary
of IEEE P1159.1 task force which is charged
with writing a Guide For Recorder and Data
Acquisition Requirements For Characterization of Power Quality Events.
Daniels background includes project studies involving dispersed generation,
automatic generation control, the application and implementation of artificial
intelligence to electric power systems, and the modeling and simulation of
synchronous machines

Ashok Sundaram (M) is a project manager

in the Custom Power Target of the Distribution
Business Unit in the Power Delivery Group, at
the Electric Power Research Institute in Palo
Alto, California. He served as EPRIs project
manager for the Distribution System Power
Quality Monitoring Project. Ashok received a
bachelor of science degree in electrical
engineering degree from the University of
Madras, India, in 1978, and a master of science
degree in electrical engineering from Southern
Illinois University in 1984. He has also
completed his course requirements for his Ph.D.
in electrical engineering. He is a member of the
IEEE and has been an invited speaker, lecturer, and session chairman at many
power quality related conferences and seminars and has published several
articles and papers in this field.