EEE 6906

  Reliability of Power System

  Substation Reliability Assessment
  October 2017

A H Chowdhury
Professor, EEE, BUET
Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Fault Tree Analysis

• Originally developed in 1960s by Bell Laboratory

• Fault tree analysis build a diagram of all elements that may contribute to a
system failure, and then trace back the groups of elements that will
necessarily lead to system’s undesired situation

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Basic event: refers to a single

initiating fault that could not be
developed any further
Basic Events must be
independent from each other
Intermediate event: refers to an
event that is caused by two or
more antecedent events acting
through logic gates

AND gate

OR gate

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Fault tree for series connection system Fault tree for parallel connection system
1

1 2 n 2

p(system)  p(1). p(2)..... p(n) q( system)  q(1).q(2).....q(n)

p( system)  1  q( system)

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Busbar A

CB_A CB_D

CT

CB_E

85% 15%
CB_B

CB_F

CB_C

Busbar B

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Event Tree for the example

Primary CB Success Failure

protection Success State 1

Success State 2
Failure
Initiating
event CB
Success State 3
Failure

State 4
Failure

• Event tree read from left to right

• Each event branch has two outputs, failure and success of this event

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

State State description

number
1 Primary protection (Line Differential Protection) works successfully;
Associated circuit breakers(CB_A,CB_B,CB_E) trip successfully; Fault cleared
immediately; Only the faulted line/generator will be isolated.
2 Primary protection works successfully; One or more than one of the
associated circuit breakers(CB_A,CB_B,CB_E) fails to trip; circuit breaker
failure function is activated, next level circuit breakers (CB_D, CB_C,CB_F
and circuit breakers within other substation) are tripped; Fault cleared after
a time delay; Besides faulted line/generator, neighboring lines/generators
are isolated because of circuit breaker failure function.
3 Primary protection fails; Back-up protection (distance protection) works
successfully; Fault cleared after a time delay; Normally, only faulted
line/generator will be isolated because back-up protection trips the same
circuit breakers as the primary protection does.
4 Primary protection fails; Back-up protection fails; Not considered;

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Substation Reliability Evaluation Methods

Event Tree calculation for the example system

Initiating Primary Circuit breakers Success Failure End
Event protection state

A(pri) A(CB)
U(ini) U(ini)*A(pri) U(ini)*A(pri) *A(CB) U(ini)*A(pri) *A(CB) 1
Success Success
U(CB)
U(ini)*A(pri) *U(CB) U(ini)*A(pri) *U(CB) 2
Failure

Back-up protection
U(pri) A(back-up)
U(ini)*U(pri) U(ini)*U(pri) *A(bac) U(ini)*A(pri) *A(bac) 3
Failure Success

U(back-up)
U(ini)*U(pri) *U(bac) U(ini)*A(pri) *U(bac) 4

Failure

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Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Fig. A
Consider only short circuit failures of – Failure of T1: input breaker B3 should operate,
transformers and subsequent effect on interruption of load point L1
the indices of the two load points – Failure of T2: input breaker B4 should operate,
interruption of load point L1

B3 T1 B1
• Outage time of load points will be the repair
X X L1 or replacement time for appropriate
transformer
B4 T2 B2 – Load point reliability indices
Fig. A X X L2

T1 B1
X L1
B3 • Fig. B
X – Failure of T1: input breaker B3 should operate,
T2 B2
X L2 interruption of load points L1 and L2
Fig. B
– Failure of T2: input breaker B3 should operate,
interruption of load points L1 and L2

• Indices are dependent on subsequent

operational procedures

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Case (a) Isolation of failed component not possible

• If it is not possible or practical to isolate failed component, breaker B3 will

remain open until relevant component has been repaired or replaced

• Both load points will remain disconnected until this has been achieved

• Indices will be:

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Case (b) Isolation of failed component is possible

• It is possible to isolate a failed component using physically existing
disconnects (isolators) or by disconnecting appropriate connections
– In either case protection breaker that has operated can be reclosed after the
component is isolated
• After T1 has failed, it is isolated, B3 is reclosed and load L2 is reconnected
– L1 is interrupted for repair or replacement time of T1 but L2 is interrupted only
for relevant isolation or switching time
• A similar situation occurs if T2 fails s( ) switching or isolation
time of failed component
• Indices will be:

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Logistics Aspects
• Misconceptions occasionally arise in regard to outage times values, particularly
switching or isolation time
• Outage time must be measured from the instant the failure occurs to the instant
at which load is reconnected
• Both repair and switching times contain several logistic aspects
a) time for a failure to be noted (if S/S not on-line, includes time it takes for a customer to
notify utility of supply failure)
b) time to locate failed component
c) time to travel to location of failed component and relevant disconnects (isolators) and
breakers
d) time required to make appropriate operating decisions
e) time to perform required action itself
• Therefore, switching times in particular are very much greater than actual time
needed to complete switching sequence itself

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Example System of Fig. A

Transformer reliability data
• failure rate = 0.1 f/yr
• repair time = 50 hrs
• switching time = 2 hrs System of Fig. B
Isolation not possible
B3 T1 B1
X X L1

B4 T2 B2
Fig. A X X L2

T1 B1
B3 X L1 Isolation is possible
X
T2 B2
Fig. B X L2

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Example
Reliability data for system

• Annual outage time dominated by that of T3

• This effect can be reduced by using a spare transformer rather than
repairing the failed one

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

Reliability indices of load point A (and B and C)

• If a spare transformer is
available and can be installed in
10 hours
• values of r and U for this failure
event reduce to 10 hours and 0.1
hour/yr
• System indices then become:
λ = 0.137 f/yr
r = 5.2 hours
U = 0.710 hours/yr

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Effect of Short Circuits & Breaker Operation

• Generally one spare transformer and other system components used to service
several operating transformers

• Economic appraisal necessary to judge merits of investing in one or more spares and
benefits accruing
– It is assumed that number of failures is less than or equal to number of spares available and
that spares can be restocked or components repaired before further failures occur

• This assumption valid

– failure rate of system components is very small, although it does mean that each spare must
not be expected to service a large number of system components

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Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Operating & Failure States of Components

• Previous example considered short circuits and their effect on subsequent

switching

• Other failure modes must be considered

• Not necessary to identify separately each individual mode of failure

– Modes of failure which have identical effect on system behavior can be grouped
together and represented by a single set of component indices

• For most system components, the pooled system states are:

a) operates successfully

b) suffers an open circuit

c) suffers a short circuit

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Operating & Failure States of Components

• In the case of breakers several other states must be considered because of

their switching actions

• Seven operating and failure states for normally closed breakers

1) operates successfully in its closed state

2) opens successfully when required to do so

3) fails to open when required to do so

4) opens inadvertently when not requested to do so

5) suffers an open circuit

6) suffers a short circuit on the busbar side

7) suffers a short circuit on the line side

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Operating & Failure States of Components

• In the case of a normally open breaker operating and failure states are:
1) closes successfully when required to do so

2) fails to close when required to do so

3) suffers a short circuit on the busbar side

4) suffers a short circuit on the line side

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Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

Open circuits and inadvertent opening of breakers

• When an open circuit fault occurs on a component, protection system

generally does not operate

• Fault manifests itself therefore only on the component that has failed and
other system components remain energized

• If protection breakers do operate, it is a failure

• This type of failure treated the same way as a short circuit failure of the
component

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

• Open circuits of components occur very infrequently and can usually be

ignored
– Does not apply to normally closed breakers which can suffer inadvertent opening
due to malfunction of the protection system or breaker itself

– These malfunctions manifest as an open circuit and are treated accordingly

• If open circuits and inadvertent opening of breakers do not cause

protection breakers to operate
– an appropriate set of indices must be estimated which represents open circuit
(including inadvertent opening) failure rate

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

Short circuits

• The dominant source of component failures

– Always cause operation of the protection system

• Different system effect from that of open circuits

– Must be categorized separately and appropriate indices estimated

• Basic method for assessing the impact of short circuits on reliability is intuitive
– identifies protection breakers that trip following short circuit failure of a component
– deduces whether these cause interruption of load point being analyzed
– evaluation is relatively simple for most system components

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

• Two base scenarios for circuit breakers

a) the breakers cannot clear their own faults and therefore the indices

represent total short circuit failures of the respective breakers

b) the breakers can clear some of their own faults and therefore the indices

have already been allocated to the appropriate components

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

• Breakers which can clear their own short circuits

i. Short-circuit indices associated with busbar side of the breaker combined with
reliability indices of the busbar
ii. Short-circuit indices associated with line side of the breaker are either:
(a) allocated to the breaker being considered

• breaker is identified as a system component and inadvertent opening indices allocated

to it

(b) combined with reliability indices of the line

• breaker is neglected as a component but its inadvertent opening indices combined with
reliability indices of the next component in the branch in which the breaker exists

• indices are combined as for series components

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Open & Short Circuit Failures

Reliability data of breakers

Breaker Failure rate Repair Switching
time (hr) time (hr)
Open ckt. Short ckt. Total
(f/yr) (f/yr) (f/yr)
2 0.003 0.002 0.005 50 1.0
4, 6-8 0.005 0.005 0.010 20 1.0

Modified reliability indices for load point A

Failed component λ (f/yr) r (hours) U (hours/yr)
h.v. line 1 0.05 0.5 0.025
h.v.breaker 2 0.005 50 0.250
transformer 3 0.01 10 0.100
l.v.breaker 4 0.01 20 0.200
Assumed: transformer can be l.v.busbar 5 0.005 5 0.025
replaced by a spare in 10 hrs l.v.breaker 6 0.01 20 0.200
l.v.breaker 7 0.005 1 0.005
l.v.breaker 8 0.005 1 0.005
l.v.feeder 9 0.05 5 0.250

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Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Active and Passive Failures

• Switching actions must be modeled and simulated in reliability evaluation

process

• When a switching action occur, three-state model required

i. state before the fault
ii. state after the fault but before isolation
iii. state after isolation but before repair is completed

• When breakers are not required to operate, (open circuits and inadvertent
operation of breakers) two-state model only is necessary
i. state before the fault
ii. state after the fault but before repair is completed

• If the repair process same in both cases, the two models can be superimposed

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Active and Passive Failures

Failure Active failure

U S U U S

Repair Repair
Repair Switching Switching
Passive Passive
U = up state failure failure
S = switching or isolation state
R R R
R = repair state

Three-state component model Two-state component model State space diagram for
active and passive failures

Two modes of failure

i. Passive failure leading to state R
ii. Active failure leading to state S

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Active and Passive Failures

Passive event
• A component failure mode that does not cause operation of protection breakers
and therefore does not have an impact on remaining healthy components
– Service restored by repairing or replacing
– Examples: open circuits and inadvertent opening of breakers

Sequences following passive and active failures

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Active and Passive Failures

Active event
• A component failure mode that causes operation of primary protection zone
around failed component and can therefore cause removal of other healthy
components and branches from service
– Actively failed component isolated and protection breakers reclosed
– Leads to service being restored to some or all load points
– Failed component itself can be restored to service only after repair or replacement

Sequences following active failures

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Active and Passive Failures

Effect of failure mode Active failure

U S
• Essential requirement of reliability assessment: identify
Repair
whether failure causes failure of load point of interest Switching
Passive
– If it does, event must be counted as a load point failure event failure

– If it does not, event can be disregarded as far as load point of R

interest is concerned

• Consequently it is necessary to determine whether state R

and/or state S constitutes a load point failure event

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Active and Passive Failures

• If a passive event leads to failure of a given load point, i.e. state R is a load
point failure event, then an active event on same component also leads to
failure of load point
– Reverse situation may not be true, state R need not be a load point failure event when
state S is

• Likely to happen in a practical system because state S represents wider outage

situation due to protection breakers being open during the existence of this
state

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Active and Passive Failures

1 1
Active failure Passive failure
U S
2

X
2

X
of breaker 6
3 3
Repair
4 6 4 6

X
X

X
X
Passive Switching
failure
R 5 7 5 7

Effect of failure modes

1
(a) System operating normally (state U), L1 L2 L1 L2
2

X
L1, L2 being supplied 3
(a) 4 6 (c)

X
X
(b) State following active failure of breaker Active failure Isolation
6 (state S), L1, L2 disconnected of breaker 6 of breaker 6
5 7
(c) State following passive failure of
breaker 6 or following switching after
active failure of breaker 6 (state R), L1 (b)
being supplied, L2 disconnected L1 L2

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Active and Passive Failures

1
• Failure events of load point L1
2

X
3
(a) passive events: 1P, 2P, 3P, 4P, 5P 4 6

X
X
(b) active events: 1A, 2A, 3A, 4A, 5A, 6A
5 7
• For each passive event, there is a corresponding active event

• Failure events can therefore be grouped together to give: L1 L2

(c) grouped events: 1(P + A), 2(P + A), 3(P + A), 4(P + A), 5(P+ A), 6A

or : 1T, 2T, 3T, 4T, 5T, 6A

P = passive, A = active, T = total (= P + A)

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Active and Passive Failures

1
• Separate identity of passive event lost
2

X
3
– it can be combined with its corresponding active event to produce a
4 6

X
X
total failure event
5 7
• Therefore component reliability data required is:

  total failure rate L1 L2

a  active failure rate(  if all failure are active events )

r  repair time
s  switching or isolation time

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Active and Passive Failures

5 1
Identification failure modes 6

X
7
• Failure events of load-point L1 10

X
8 2
(a) Total failure events
9 3

X
4 1+5 2+5 3+5

X
11 4
1+6 2+6 3+6
(b) First-order active failures: L1
1+7 2+7 3+7 3A
1+8 2+8 3+8 9A
(c) Second-order active failures:
1+9 2+9 3+9
10A+1
• Above second-order events are 10A+2
associated with overlapping forced 10A+3
outages and a forced outage • Total outage in above failure events may be due
overlapping a maintenance outage to a forced outage or a maintenance outage

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Table of Contents

 Substation reliability evaluation methods

 Effect of short circuits and breaker operation
 Operating and failure states of components
 Open and short circuit failures
 Active and passive failures
 Example: event tree method

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Example: Event Tree Method

Example
• Assessing effect of intermediate substation configurations on reliability of power
transmission corridor

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Example: Event Tree Method

Substation configurations considered

• 4/3 circuit breaker substation

• one and a half circuit breaker substation

• double busbar circuit breaker substation

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Example: Event Tree Method

Transmission
corridor with
intermediate one
and a half circuit
breaker substation

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Example: Event Tree Method

Zone division for one

and a half circuit
breaker configuration

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Example: Event Tree Method

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Example: Event Tree Method

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Example: Event Tree Method

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Example: Event Tree Method

Event tree calculation

• Unavailability value of initiating event is input to the first stage - primary
protection
– Primary protection system availability 0.999; availability of circuit breaker associated with all
protection stages 0.9985
• For each stage, success/failure is found by multiplying initiating event of that stage
with availability/unavailability of that stage
• e.g. fault occurs in L1 zone
– Unavailability of that zone initiates event tree for primary protection to react
– If it succeeds to react, its success initiates tripping of its associated circuit breakers CB_11,
CB_12, CB_L1, CB_L1_low
– If primary protection fails to operate, it initiates tripping of backup protection_1 CBs -
CB_B1, CB_21, CB_31, CB_13, CB_L2

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Example: Event Tree Method

– If any of these circuit breakers fails

to operate then it initiates backup
protection_2 CBs CB_22, CB_L3,
CB_32, CB_L5, CB_L5_low, CB_T3,
CB_B2, CB_23, CB_33, CB to trip

– If any of these circuit breakers fails

then it initiates tripping of backup
protection_3 CBs CB_L4, CB_L4_low,
CB_L6, CB_T4, CB_T1

– Failure of a circuit breaker at this

stage will lead to fault reaching
transmission corridor and a stop in
power flow through corridor

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Example: Event Tree Method

Zone wise unavailability for different substation configuration

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