2006 International Conference on Power System Technology

A Traveling Wave Based Fault Locating System

for
HVDC

Transmission Lines

Ping Chen, Bingyin Xu, Jing Li

Abstract-The modern traveling wave based fault location principles for transmission lines are analyzed. In order to apply the traveling wave principles to HVDC transmission lines, the special technical problems are studied. Based on this, a fault locating system for HVDC transmission lines is developed. The system can support the type D and type A modern traveling wave principles simultaneously, and it is composed of three different parts: traveling wave data acquisition and processing system, communication network and PC based master station. In the system, the fault generated transients are induced from the ground leads of the overvoltage suppression capacitors of a HVDC line through special developed traveling wave couplers. The system was applied to 500 kV Ge Zhouba-Nanqiao (Shanghai) HVDC transmission line in China. Some field operation experiences are summarized, showing that the system has very high reliability and accuracy, and the maximum location error is about 3 km (not more than 0.3% of the total line length). Obviously, the application of the system is very successful, and the fault location problem since the line operation has finally been solved completely. Index Terms-Data acquisition, propagation, fault location, Global Positioning System, HVDC transmission lines, Repeaters, Signal analysis, Surges, Synchronization, transducers.

presented already as early as 1950s [1], but they were gradually abandoned 1970s later due to their high cost, poor reliability and maintenance problems. With the developments of modem micro-electronics, communication and digital signal processing techniques, the traveling wave based fault location techniques have been endowed with new vitality [2], and get more and more applications in different AC transmission systems [3]-[7] since 1990s. The practical operation experiences show that the location error of modem traveling wave based fault location systems for AC transmission lines could be within 200 m [8]. In this paper, a fault locating system for HVDC transmission lines is developed, and the field operation experiences in 500 kV Ge Zhouba-Nanqiao HVDC transmission system are summarized.
II. MODERN TRAVELING WAVE BASED FAULT LOCATION PRINCIPLES

A. Double ended principle (type D) The double ended traveling wave principle calculates the fault distance using the time difference between the absolute arrival times of fault induced initial surges measured at both I. INTRODUCTION terminals of the line. A fault on a transmission line generates voltage and current T He HVDC transmission is now the important technical means for the solution of high voltage, large capacity, and surges traveling towards two terminals of the line at a speed long distance power transmission and asynchronous power close to the light, as shown in Fig. 1. network interconnection. Typically, the total length of a HVDC transmission line is above hundreds of kilometers, and the landform and the weather may have a great change along the line. This makes it very difficult to search a line fault. It is I. obvious that there will be much great realistically significant to develop fault location technology for HVDC transmission t=0 lines energetically. With high accuracy and wide applicability, the traveling Yi..11I wave based fault location principles were relatively perfect for transmission line fault location. These principles had been
This work was supported by the Provincial Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province (No. 2004ZX26). Ping Chen is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo, Shandong 255049 China (e-mail:

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Bingyin Xu is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Shandong University of Technology, Zibo, Shandong 255049 China (email:xuby ochina.com). Jing Li is with Kehui Electric Co., Ltd., Zibo, Shandong 255087 China (email: lij a)kehui.cn).

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Fig. 1 Lattice diagram for propagation of fault induced traveling waves.

The fault distance can be expressed as follows:

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{XM
1XN

2 [V(TMl

TN,) + L]

[v(ATNI -TMl)+L]

Where XM and XN are the distances from the fault to terminal M and N respectively. v is the velocity of traveling waves. L is the total line length. TM1 and TN, are the arrival times of the fault induced initial surges measured at terminal M and N respectively.
B. Single endedprinciple (type A) The single ended principle makes use of the fault induced transient traveling waves and the associated reflected waves to determine the fault location at one line terminal. According to the different sources of the reflected waves to be detected, this principle can be classified into three independent modes of operation, i.e. standard mode, extended mode and integrated mode. For the standard mode, the fault reflected wave is detected. See Fig.1 and take terminal M as the measuring terminal. When the fault generated initial surge arrives at time TM1 ,the first backward surge is detected with the propagation direction from the fault to the local bus, and at the same moment a reflected wave is produced due to impedance discontinuity. The reflected wave from local terminal is the first forward surge traveling back to the fault, and is reflected back again at the fault point. The fault reflected wave will arrive at the local terminal at time TM2 ,and the time difference between time TM2 and TM1,denoted as At, is the time interval for a surge to travel from the local measuring point to the fault and back. So the distance to fault from the measuring point can be calculated as follows: X =-vAt

C. Cooperation ofthe double and single endedprinciples The double ended principle is more reliable than the single ended one as it makes use of only the fault generated initial surges. But it requires two equipments be installed at both ends of the supervised line, and its accuracy is affected by the errors of the given line length and the synchronization clock system, such as the Global Positioning System (GPS). The single ended principle is more cost effective to realize with higher accuracy, but its reliability is not very satisfactory due to the complexity of fault reflected surge discrimination. In an actual system, the principle type D can be used independently and is the primary traveling wave based fault location method. The principle type A is used as a complementary principle to validate and revise the fault location results of principle type D.
III. SPECIAL PROBLEMS FOR HVDC TRANSMISSION LINE FAULT
LOCATION BASED ON TRAVELING WAVES

A. Surges measured at line terminals Fault location method based on traveling waves makes use of transient signals several milliseconds after a fault occurs. For a HVDC transmission system, the AC/DC converting equipments will not operate within this time interval and their influence can be neglected. Taking Ge Zhouba to Nanqiao HVDC system as an example, the terminal circuit is shown as Fig.2.
L1 =3mH L2=3mH
TA

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Fig.2 Terminal circuit of Ge Zhouba to Nanqiao HVDC transmission system.

(2)

For the extended mode, the opposite terminal reflected wave is detected. It can be seen that the reflected wave at opposite terminal (terminal N) will pass through the fault point and arrive at the local measuring point at time TM2, and

the time difference between time TM2 and TM1' denoted as At', is the time interval for a surge to travel from the fault to the opposite terminal and back. So the distance to fault from the opposite terminal can be written as: 1 X - vAt' (3)

As the TV and TA of a HVDC transmission system are installed behind the surge suppressions capacitor (C3 in Fig.2), the rising time of voltage and current surges measured from TV and TA are very slow and can not be used to locate a fault effectively. An additional sensor is needed to capture a fault induced transient signal with quick response. One alternative scheme is to induce the fault generated transients from the ground lead of the overvoltage suppression capacitors C3 through a special developed traveling wave coupler, as shown in Fig.3.

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As for the integrated mode, only the second backward surge is detected and discriminated. In general cases, this surge is either the fault reflected wave to the first forward surge of the local measuring point, or the opposite terminal reflected wave to the fault induced initial surge. So if the characteristic of the second backward surge can be correctly discriminated at the local measuring point, then the fault location can be given by "(2)" or "(3)."

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Fig.3 Measuring impulse current flowing through C3.

There are three sets of traveling wave data acquisition and processing systems installed at two converter stations A, B and one PLC repeater station R respectively. They are responsible for inducting the fault generated transients from the ground leads of the over voltage suppression capacitors of the line through special developed traveling wave couplers, acquiring them with a sampling period of 1 pts, storing them locally, exchanging them each other and sending them to the B. Effect of repeater station PC based master station through public telephone network or A repeater station for power line carrier communication is special data communication network for power systems. usually inserted to ensure communication quality along long The PC based master station is installed at a remote distance transmission line. The repeater station is equivalent to dispatching center. It is responsible for further processing the a wave trap, as shown in Fig.4. According to parameters of fault generated transient data, permanently storing them into repeater station in Ge Zhouba to Nanqiao HVDC transmission the hard disk, and automatically calculating the fault distance. system its cut off frequency is about 20 kHz. Therefore, It also provides functions for manual and computer aided significant attenuation and delay will be introduced when a transient waveform analyses. fault surge passes the repeater station, resulting in failure of incoming surge detection at the line terminal. V. OPERATION EXPERIENCES OF THE LOCATING SYSTEM L=3mH In December 2001, the State Power Corporation of China introduced into one set of above traveling wave based fault C1=lOnF C2=5OnF location system and installed on 500 kV line Ge-Nan which is the first HVDC transmission line in China from Ge Zhouba to Nanqiao as shown in Fig. 6. There are three stations along the line, i.e. Ge Zhouba converter station, Maiyuan repeater station and Nanqiao converter station each with a set of Fig.4 Repeater station in Ge Zhouba to Nanqiao HVDC system. traveling wave acquisition and processing system installed. In order to overcome the problem caused by the repeater These acquisition and processing systems are connected with station, a traveling wave acquisition system can be installed in the PC based master station through public telephone network. the repeater station responsible for taking in impulse currents 5U5 km 533 km _La of the overvoltage suppression capacitors at both sides of the wave trap circuit. I
Current flowing through C3 is proportional to the derivative of incoming voltage surge with time constant x equals to the product of Zc and C3, where Zc is the surge impedance of the line. Thus a steep impulse current almost without delay to line surge and with more than 10 pts width will be produced when incoming surge arrives. It makes accurate and reliable fault location practically possible.

IV. FAULT LOCATING SYSTEM FOR HVDC TRANSMISSION LINES The structure of the developed fault location system for a HVDC transmission line is shown in Fig.5.
A R

Ge Ehouba (Converter Station)

(Repeater Station)

(Converter Station)

Fig.6 Structure of the Ge-Nan HVDC transmission network

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Fig.5 Structure of the presented fault locating system

At 19:46:09, January 14th, 2002, a fault occurred in GeMai line section, and the final fault location provided by the location system was 130.9 km away from Ge Zhouba side. Through pole-climb inspecting to the live-line, obvious fault flashover trace was found at the right pole of No. 333 tower, which is 129.88 km away from Ge Zhouba side. A typical fog flashover fault was confirmed by further analysis. For this fault, the absolute location error was 1.02 km. At 14:38:28, January 18th, 2002, another fault occurred in Mai-Nan line section. Using the original given length of the Mai-Nan line section, i.e. 513 km, the fault location resulted from type D double ended traveling wave principle was 128.3 km away from Maiyuan side. But the fault location derived from type A single ended traveling wave principle should be 123.3 km away from Maiyuan side and 381.7 km away from Nanqiao side respectively. As great difference (5 km) existed for the location results by two different principles, it was concluded that great difference existed for the original given length of the Mai-Nan line section. So the fault location derived from type A traveling wave principle was selected as

the final location results. Moreover, the length of the Mai-Nan line section was revised as 505 km by the type A traveling wave based location results at both sides of this line section. The actual fault location was 384.15 km away from Nanqiao side. For this fault, the absolute location error was 2.45 km. It is obvious that the application of the fault location system in the Ge-Nan HVDC transmission line is very successful and the fault location problem since the line operation has finally been solved completely. Table I gives a statistics of fault location of the locating system in 2002, showing that the maximum location error of the developed locating system is 3.12 km.
TABLE I
STATISTICS OF FAULT LOCATION OF THE LOCATION SYSTEM IN 2002

[8]

power lines." Automation of Electric Power Systems, vol. 30, pp 68-73, Mar. 2006. Chen Ping, Xu Bingyin, Li Jing, et al, "Development of modern traveling wave based fault location system," Automation of Electric Power Systems, vol. 27, pp. 81-85, Jun. 2003.

VIII. BIOGRAPHIES
Ping Chen was born in 1969. He obtained the B. S. and M. S. degrees from Xi'an Jiaotong University in 1991 and 1994 respectively, and the PhD degree from the same university in 2003. From 1994 to 2003, he worked for Zibo Kehui Electric Co Ltd on the research and development of fault location systems and integrated substation automation systems. He is currently an associate professor of Shandong University of Technology. Bingyin Xu was born in 1961. He received the B. S. and M. S. degrees from Shandong University of Technology in 1982 and 1987 respectively, and the PhD degree from Xi'an Jiaotong University in 1991. During his PhD studies he spent two years in England as a student abroad. He is currently a professor of Shandong University of Technology, and the director of Shandong Kehui Electric Co Ltd. He is a Member of the IEEE. Jing Li was born in 1967. He obtained the B. S. and M. E. degrees from Xi'an Jiaotong University in 1991 and 2006 respectively. Since 1993, he has been working for Zibo Kehui Electric Co Ltd on the development of fault location systems. He is a Senior Engineer at the company.

Fault Time

Away from Ge Zhouba

Location Result (km)

130.9

Away from

Naniac
331.7 3314 3184.52 381.4 381.4 301.4 62 462 462 42 4

Actual Location (km) Away from Away from Ge Zhouba Nanqiao

Location Enr (km)

2002-01 -144119:6:09 2002-01 -18114:38:28 2002-01 -18114:42:02 2002-01 -1918:12:40 2002-01-19108:23:19 2002-0 1-19111:53:39 2002- 12-0 1 fd :25:19 2002- 12-0 1 37 :47:01 2002- 12-0 17:54:10 2002- 12-0 17:5546

129.88
384.15 382.65
383.667

1.02 2.45 -3.12 -1.25

2.267

383k.47

-2.067

2002-12-01OS8:46:34

464.891 464.891 464.891 464.891 45.5

-2.891
-2.891
-2.891

-2.891 -1.5

VI. CONCLUSION A fault location system for HVDC transmission lines, using modem traveling wave based fault location technology, with its operation experiences in the Ge-Nan HVDC transmission system are summarized in this paper. The field operation experiences show that with the cooperation of the double and single ended traveling wave principles, the presented location system has very high reliability and accuracy, and the maximum location error is about 3 km, i.e. not more than 0.30o of the total line length. VII. REFERENCES
[1] [2]
Ge Yaozhong Ge, New Types of Protective Relaying and Fault Location: Theory and Techniques, Xi'an: Xi'an Jiaotong University Press, 1996, p. 264. Xu Bingyin, Li Jing, Chen Ping, et al, "Modern traveling wave based fault location technology and its application," Automation of Electric Power Systems, vol. 25, pp. 62-65, Dec. 2001. H. Lee, A M. Mousa, "GPS traveling wave fault locator systems: Investigation into the anomalous measurements related to lightning strikes," IEEE Trans. Power Delivery, vol. 11, pp. 1214-1223, Jul. 1996. P. F. Gale, P. V. Taylor, P. Naidoo, et al, "Traveling wave fault locator experience on Eskom's transmission network," in Proc. 2001 Seventh International Conference on Developments in Power System Protection, pp. 327-330. Qin Jian, Huang Zhen, Yang Hua, et al, "Study on traveling wave propagation in double-circuit parallel transmission line," Proceedings of the Chinese Society of Electrical Engineering, vol. 24, pp. 30-34, May, 2004. Ji Tao, Xue Yong-Duan, Sun Tong-Jing, et al, "Fault location for distribution feeders based on traveling waves," Automation of Electric Power Systems, vol. 29, pp. 66-71, Oct. 2005. Xue Yong-Duan, Xu Bing-Yin, Li Jing, et al, "Traveling waves based fault location in 10 kV automatic blocking and continuous railway

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