International Journal of Applied Power Engineering (IJAPE)
Vol 15, No 3: September 2026

Explainable AI for harmonic fingerprinting and voltage sag diagnosis in decentralized power grids: trends, challenges and future directions

Mohd Hatta Jopri (Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka)
Tole Sutikno (Universitas Ahmad Dahlan)
Yacine Djeghader (Souk-Ahras University)
Mohd Riduan Mohd Shariff (Malaysian Refining Company Sdn. Bhd.)
Wan Azlan Wan Zainal Abidin (Universiti Malaysia Sarawak)



Article Info

Publish Date
01 Sep 2026

Abstract

The evolution of decentralized power grids has increased the complexity of power-quality monitoring, particularly harmonic fingerprinting and voltage sag diagnosis. Artificial intelligence improves disturbance detection and classification, yet black-box models limit transparency, engineering validation, and operator trust. This review synthesizes 108 selected studies on explainable artificial intelligence (XAI) for power-system diagnostics, focusing on SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP), local interpretable model-agnostic explanations (LIME), attention-based interpretability, visual analytics, and physics-informed learning. The review integrates harmonic fingerprinting with voltage sag diagnosis through their shared requirements for source attribution, temporal interpretation, physical consistency, and operator-oriented explanation. Four major deployment gaps are identified: data quality, computational latency, physical grounding, and trustworthiness. Future priorities include real-time embedded XAI, physics-informed neural networks, federated learning, standardized trustworthiness metrics, and adaptive model lifecycle management. The findings indicate that reliable autonomous diagnosis requires explainability to be integrated with predictive performance, electrical-system physics, computational efficiency, and field validation. This integration provides a stronger foundation for transparent, resilient, and trustworthy diagnostic systems in decentralized power grids.

Copyrights © 2026






Journal Info

Abbrev

IJAPE

Publisher

Subject

Electrical & Electronics Engineering

Description

International Journal of Applied Power Engineering (IJAPE) focuses on the applied works in the areas of power generation, transmission and distribution, sustainable energy, applications of power control in large power systems, etc. The main objective of IJAPE is to bring out the latest practices in ...