Pre-filtering improves Prony analysis of disturbance records

Prony analysis provides resolution of closely spaced multiple modes in signals with high signal to noise ratio. Results are not satisfactory for practical noisy signals recorded during power system disturbances. Attenuation of estimated parameters is the outcome in the case of low signal to noise ratio. This paper presents the application of the smoothing filter for pre-processing signals before using Prony's method. This technique is tested on real power system examples.