Course Objective: This is a first course on power system protection.

Power system protection is about (1) detecting faults or abnormalities in the electrical energy systems and (2) taking remedial action like tripping of faulty apparatus to minimize damage as well as provide safety to the human life. This function is implemented by a `decision making element' called a relay. A relay can be thought of as a micrprocessor which primarily processes analog current and voltage signals for decision making. The voltage and current signals are derived from transducers called voltage and current transformers. A clear understanding of CTs and VTs and its interaction with relays is a must. In this course, we will introduce the fundamentals of apparatus and system protection. There are three fundamental principles of apparatus protection viz. overcurrent, distance and differential protection. Overcurrent and distance protection is primarily used for feeder and transmission line protection while differential protection is mainly used in bus bar, transformer and generator stator winding protection. These principles will be introduced by considering first the transmission line/feeder protection problem. On the other hand, system protection is primarily achieved by underfrequency, overfrequency and rate of change of frequency relays. System protection will be briefly covered in the course. Then we will study two important transducers known as Voltage and Current transformers (VT and CT) which scale down the corresponding KV and KA signals to lower voltages and current. The relay element reads these scaled down signals. Faithful replication of the primary side signal is key requirement for successful design of protection system. This calls for a clear understanding of CTs and VTs. This aspect is treated adequately in this course. From a application engineers perspective relays have to set and co-ordinated properly. For this purpose, in this course, we will study sequence components and fault analysis. Relay setting and co-ordination for distance and overcurrent relays will be discussed in sufficient detail. Today, relays are engineered on microprocessors through digital signal processing techniques. Hence, we will also study DSP techniques like sampling theorem, Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT). Estimation of current and voltage phasors from discrete samples and measurement of derived quantities like active and reactive power, frequency etc will be covered. We will follow this up, with algorithms used by numerical relays for overcurrent, distance and differential protection. It is recommended that this course be introduced as a follow up to following courses (1) power system analysis (2) signal and systems and (3) microprocessors. This course can be used both at under graduate or postgraduate level. It will also be useful to working professionals. Through out this course, we have followed the well know dictum viz. `Simplify as much as you can but not any further'. We hope that the course will fill the void between legacy protection courses based on electromechanical and solid state relays and advanced courses based primarily on numerical relaying.