Abstract: To improve the intelligence of water level measurement and control devices in intelligent hydropower plant, we present an intelligent water level transmitter in this article. Through analysis on the communication network structure of hydropower plants, we point out that the data format does not meet the technical requirements of smart grid, and expound the demand for intelligent communication function of transmitters. On this basis, we build a hardware platform for smart transmitter system, and establish the information model of smart transmitter in line with IEC 61850 standard. Furthermore, we complete the communication service configuration and give the block diagram of the intelligent transmitter system. Finally, we design an experimental program of running IEDScout software to receive data on both two PCs, and captured and analyzed MMS packet by Wireshark. Experimental result shows that the constructed information model and communication server mode meet the requirement of water level data posed by IEC 61850 standard. The information is self-descriptive and has a strong character of sharing. With the information model reconstruction or expansion, the system platform has the capacity to meet other non-power data’s acquisition and processing requirements, which is in line with the strategic requirement of primary equipment intelligence.

Key words: IEC 61850, water level transmitter, intelligent electronic device, server mode, intelligent hydropower station