1. Audification And Sonification Of Power Grid Data
ECE 498
Pat Cowden
Advisor: Professor Dosiek

2. Background
Power Grid Frequency is at 60 Hz but constantly fluctuates by values of a few mHz
Voltage Magnitude constantly changes do to applied loads across the Grid
V(t) = √2 A(t)cos(2πfct + θ(t))

3. Project Discription
Data will be processed from historic U.S. geographical data as well as data captured from Power Systems Lab
Project will be fully written in MATLAB
Audification will generate audio sample representing the power grid voltage over measured time period
Sonification will generate a MIDI file mapping the voltage magnitude and frequency fluctuations over measured time period

4. Power Grid Station Voltage

5. Audification Approach

6. Voltage Magnitude Plot

7. Frequency Plot

8. Sonification Approach
Data processed and Frequency and Voltage magnitude MIDI parameters are generated
Frequency deviations controls pitch values
Four Octave Range of Pitch Values
Voltage magnitude controls velocity values
Using existing MIDI file generator script, MIDI parameters will generate a MIDI file which will be played through a virtual audio synthesizer

9. Potential Difficulties
Dissonance in successive sonified notes
Identifying appropriate subset size for both techniques
Generating complex non pure tone sounds for Audification approach
Processing other signal parameters

10. Project Importance
Power Grid Education for students and general public
Power Grid Signal Processing Research
Power grid station analysis to examine forced grid oscillations

11. Project Support
“All sonifications, however, may have musical effects on listeners, as our trained ears with daily exposure to music tend to naturally distinguish musical and non-musical sound relationships, such as harmony, rhythmic stability, or timbral balance”
-Jason Freeman, and Lee W. Lerner, Tsuchiya, Takahiko. ”Data-To-Music API: Real- Time Data-Agnostic Sonification With Musical Structure Models.” The 21st International Conference On Auditory Display (2015) : July Web Oct

12. Similar Work Network Metadata Sonification Seismograph Audification
Pitch and time used to represent the data flow rate
Seismograph Audification
ch-earthquake

13. Questions?

14. References
Dosiek, Luke. "Extracting Electrical Network Frequency From Digital Recordings Using Frequency Demodulation." IEEE Signal Processing Letters 22.6 (2015): IEEE Xplore. Web. 22 Sept
Freeman, Jason, Lerner, Lee W., Tsuchiya, Takahiko. ”Data-To-Music API: Real-Time Data-Agnostic Sonification With Musical Structure Models.” The 21st International Conference On Auditory Display (2015) : July Web. 24 Oct
McGee, Ryan, Andy Michael, Stock Plum, and D. Rogers V. "Sounds of Seismic – Earth System Soundscape.” Web. 22 Sept
Worrall, David. "Real-Time Sonification and Visualization of Network Metadata." The 21st International Conference On Auditory Display (2015): July Web. 24 Oct