MEASUREMENT OF THE SWITCHING OVER-VOLTAGES AT THE DISCONNECTION OF THE HIGH VOLTAGE SHUNT REACTORS IN THE ROMANIAN POWER SYSTEM

Paul Constantin STROICA, Ion MERFU, Mihail STROICA, Marius MERFU, Florian COJOCARU, Dinu STEFAN and Mihai COJOCARU

SUMMARY The paper presents the measurements of the switching over-voltages made in the Romanian Power System, at the 400/220/110 kV Urechesti substation at the disconnection of a 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor type DFAL, Siemens, Germany, in 3 consecutive versions. The first one is for shunt reactor controlled by live-tank oil circuit breaker, the second one is for shunt reactor controlled by SF6 circuit breaker, and the third one is for shunt reactor controlled by SF6 circuit breaker and synchronize device. In order to have the guarantee that the switching devices will have a suitable behavior in the power systems, they should be tested in high power laboratories, as well as, on site. The measurements and tests will allow the producers and the end-users to have reliable equipment in order to increase the safety in operation in the power systems. Although the measurements on site ask for a suitable technical devices, such as: transducers, transmission systems for measurement signals, recording and processing systems and control circuits, the costs of the measurements will be much lower than those in the high power laboratories [1]. The paper presents the measurements made in the Romanian Power System, at the 400/220/110 kV Urechesti substation at the disconnection of a 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor type DFAL, Siemens, Germany. KEYWORDS Shunt reactor Switching device Over-voltages Synchronize device Measurement conditions
Paul Constantin Stroica, SMART SA Craiova Subsidiary, ROMANIA, p.stroic@smartcv.ro Ion Merfu, TRANSELECTRICA SA Craiova Subsidiary, ROMANIA, ion.merfu@transelectrica.ro Mihail Stroica, TRANSELECTRICA SA Craiova Subsidiary, ROMANIA, mihai.stroica@transelectrica.ro Marius Merfu, ENERGOTECH SA Bucharest, ROMANIA, marius.merfu@energotech.ro Florian Cojocaru, ENERGOTECH SA Bucharest, florian.cojocaru@energotech.ro Dinu Stefan, SMART S.A. Craiova Subsidiary, ROMANIA, dinu.stefan@smartcv.ro Mihai Cojocaru, ENERGOTECH S.A. Bucharest, ROMANIA, mihai.cojocaru@energotech.ro

1. INTRODUCTION In order to have the guarantee that the switching devices will have a suitable behavior in the power systems, they should be tested in high power laboratories, as well as, on site. The measurements and tests will allow the producers and the end-users to have reliable equipment in order to increase the safety in operation in the power systems. Although the measurements on site ask for a suitable technical devices, such as: transducers, transmission systems for measurement signals, recording and processing systems and control circuits, the costs of the measurements will be much lower than those in the high power laboratories [1]. The paper presents the measurements made in the Romanian Power System, at the 400/220/110 kV Urechesti substation at the disconnection of a 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor type DFAL, Siemens, Germany. 2. CONSIDERATIONS ON SHUNT REACTORS SWITCHING STRESSES The shunt reactors are important elements of electric systems, which have to be protected against abnormal regime. Because of their attachment manner in circuit, they are protected against overload and short circuit current effects. Due to the d.c. component, it is only possible a temporary increasing of the current on connection up to a maximum value, lower than the double of current peak value in normal regime. For shunt reactor, this does not represent a dangerous stress, neither thermal, nor electrodynamics. Analyzing some faults, it has been noticed that they have occurred due to the local deterioration of insulation, pursuant to transient over-voltages on current switching with voltages circuit breakers. Regarding stress, shunt reactors switching is included in switching of small inductive current category. The particularities of this regime are: - switching current is equal with rated current of shunt reactor, therefore lower than breaking current of circuit breaker; - in many cases, current breaking occurs a little bit before natural passing through zero, a phenomena named current chopping; - due to the big value of shunt reactor inductance, the stored energy (magnetic energy) determines an increasing of terminal voltage and therefore a tough shunt reactor insulation stress; - according to circuit breaker performances and certain aleatory parameters (moment of contact opening when voltage passes through zero, distance between contact in the moment of current breaking), an arc re-ignition can occur, a fact that can generate supplementary stresses (voltages with high speed variation). The current chopping is caused by arc instability (a current oscillation with a high frequency and with amplitude that rapidly increases, superimposed on the current at rated frequency). So, the current will pass through zero before the moment it would normally do. The oscillation frequency is much higher than the rated frequency, so that the current passing from Ich to zero can be assumed to be instantaneous. At passing through zero, the current is interrupted. The chopping current is the value which the rated frequency current would have in the moment of breaking. The chopping current value depends on a lot of parameters such as: - quenching medium; - number of quenching chambers connected in series per pole (the chopped current

increases with the growing of chambers number per pole); - equivalent capacitance value on circuit breaker terminals (a bigger capacitance causes a bigger chopping current). The shunt reactor on which the experimental determinations have been made is DFAL 8056 400 kV/100 MVAr type. The main characteristics are: - rated current: 144.3 A at 400 kV; - inductance: 5.017 H (average value); - capacitance between a phase winding and earth: 3531 pF (average value); - longitudinal capacitance of a phase winding: 345 pF (average value); - power factor cos: 0.0078295. 3. MEASUREMENT CONDITIONS In operation the circuit breakers carry out the disconnection of the rating current, the shortcircuit current, as well as, the small inductive current of the off-load transformers and off-load motors and shunt reactors. The main switching duties (short-circuit, short-line fault, capacitive current) of the high voltage circuit breakers have been already regulated, the switching of the small inductive currents of the shunt reactors was regulated by the IEC 1233/1997. In this case the switching over-voltages have a special character against other switching duties. The switching of the shunt reactors is a duty in which small difference of the circuit parameters can produce big difference of the stress in high voltage circuit breakers operation. Accordingly, it is recommended that the high voltage circuit breakers to be tested also on site. Test laboratories might have a limited capacity for testing the shunt reactors in switching duties. Accordingly, it can be realize tests in artificial circuits in laboratory conditions with concentrate elements (R, L, C), or in real circuits with shunt reactor in power system. In this last case there are limitative conditions regarding the load current and the parameters of the transient recovery voltage (TRV). So, we made the measurement of the switching over-voltages in the Romanian Power System, at the 400/220/110 kV Urechesti substation at the disconnection of a 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor type DFAL, Siemens, Germany, in 3 consecutive versions [2]. 1. Shunt reactor controlled by live-tank oil circuit breaker, type IO-400 kV, made by ELECTROPUTERE, Romania. 2. Shunt reactor controlled by SF6 circuit breaker, type HPL-420 kV, made by ABB, Sweden. 3. Shunt reactor controlled by SF6 circuit breaker, type HPL-420 kV and synchronize switching device SWITHCSYNC F236, made by ABB, Sweden [3]. 4. CONTROLLED SWITCHING OF SHUNT REACTORS USING SYNCHRONIZE SWITCHING DEVICE SWITCHSYNC F236 Controlled switching is used for elimination of harmful electrical transients upon planned switching of mainly capacitor banks, shunt reactors and power transformer. The method is also gaining acceptance for re-energizing EHV transmission lines, and replacing traditional pre-insertion resistors. A key aspect of all controlled switching applications is the precision achieved during making and breaking. The live tank SF6 circuit breakers are particularly well suited for controlled switching due to

their good stability in regards to mechanical operating time and dynamic dielectric behavior. In addition, the SWITCHSYNC F236 device is equipped with a special adaptive control, which compensates for any systematic variations in operating time. Necessary signals for the function are received from existing instrument transformers. Supplementary, the SWITCHSYNC F236 device has provisions for two external, predictive inputs (e.g. temperature variations, control voltage). These functions make it possible to achieve added precision in the timing of the controlled circuit breaker. It also has a data memory that stores information on switching times, thus permitting condition monitoring of the circuit breaker. SWITCHSYNC F236 controller for shunt reactor circuit breakers is normally used for control of opening operations. Uncontrolled de-energizing will, in a typical case, case re-ignition in at least one circuit breaker pole. By controlling the contact separation in such a manner that short arcing times will not occur, re-ignition will be eliminated. The remaining voltage transient is a harmless chopping over-voltage with relatively low frequency. A normal value of the targeted arcing time is 5-6 ms, but for small reactors the targeted arcing time may even be longer than cycle of the current. In this case, there will be minor re-ignition transients at the first current zero after contact separation, while final interruption, without re-ignitions, will take place at the second current zero. 5. SHUNT REACTOR CONTROLLED BY LIVE-TANK OIL CIRCUIT BREAKER The 400 kV Urechesti substation diagram is as in Fig. 1. We also present in Fig. 2, Fig. 3 and Fig. 4, pictures of the Urechesti substation with 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor to be tested, the equipments from the 400 kV shunt reactor bay and the high voltage testing equipment.

Figure 1. The 400 kV Urechesti substation diagram The diagram according to Fig. 1 is consisting of: - the substation 400 kV bus bars (shunt reactor on 2B 400 kV bus bar)

selector switch disconnector, Q2, type SMEP, 400 kV, 1600 A live-tank oil circuit breaker, Q1, type IO, 400 kV, 1600 A current instrument transformer, Tc, type CESUk, 400 kV, 1200/1/1/1/1 A voltage instrument transformer, Tt, type TECU, 400/0.1/3 kV feeder disconnector, Q9, type SMEP, 400 kV, 1600 A shunt reactor, type DFAL 400 kV, 144 A, 100 MVAr, connection YN, impedance Z = 1576 .

Figure 2. The equipment from the 400 kV shunt reactor bay A. The measurement diagram In 400/220/110 kV Urechesti substation was made the following measurements and recordings: - the closing control current; - the opening control current; - the load currents on each phase R, S, T; - the phase voltages; - the switching over-voltages at disconnection; - the reference supply voltage, using two parallel measuring systems; the first one is an analogical system consisting of the measurement chain including the capacitor dividers, coaxial cables (Cb; Z = 75 ; L = 20 mH), amplifiers, magneto-electric oscillograph and cathode-ray oscillograph; the second one is a digital system including the capacitor dividers, galvanic insulators (I; 1.5 kV; 10 kHz), personal computer (PC) with acquisition card NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS, 12 bits.

Figure 3. The 400 kV, 100 MVAr shunt reactor to be tested

Figure 4. The high voltage testing equipment The digital system using optic fiber was used to back up the influence of the external electromagnetic fields on the measuring chain. According to the diagram presented in Fig. 1, the voltages and the switching over-voltages was measured with 300 kV / 40 V capacitor dividers (DT).

Figure 5. The measurement and recording diagram of the switching over- voltages using the digital system. According to the diagram presented in Fig. 5, the measure signals on the dividers were transmitted by the coaxial cables both to the analogical system and to the digital system, adapted with Hewlett Packard amplifiers (A, kA = x2; f = 1 MHz) on the magneto-electric oscillograph, cathode-ray oscillograph and personal computer inputs, at once. The measuring error is 3 %. With the cathode-ray oscillograph was recorded at once the switching over-voltages. With the magneto-electric oscillograph was recorded all the variables. The closing and the opening of the circuit breaker was realized by the programmer. B. The measurement and recording results There were made 10 closing and opening operations on 400 kV shunt reactor circuit breaker on 18el. shift. The disconnection of the shunt reactor was made especially at 0el. and 90el., which were considered the most important moments for a comparative recording of the switching over-voltages. The test results are presented in the Table I. It was recorded the following variables: - the voltages supply UR, US, UT; - the switching over-voltages UCR, UCS, UCT; - the load currents IR, IS, IT.

Figure 6. The oscillogram from the test no. 1, using the digital system.

The oscillogram from the test no. 2 is presented in Fig. 7. This oscillogram was realized using the analogic system.

Figure 7. The oscillogram from the test no. 2, using the analogical system. The arrangement of the data from the PC was made using a LABVIEW program, and the data from the oscillographes was made using calibration constants.The oscillogram from the test no. 1 is presented in Fig. 6. This oscillogram was realized using the digital system.

Table I. Test results for the switching over-voltages of the shunt reactor controlled by livetank oil circuit breaker

6. SHUNT REACTOR CONTROLLED BY SF6 CIRCUIT BREAKER WITH AND WITHOUT THE SYNCHRONIZE SWITCHING DEVICE SWITCHSYNC F236 In this case, the diagram according to Fig. 1 is consisting of: - the substation 400 kV bus bars (shunt reactor on 2B 400 kV bus bar) - selector switch disconnector, Q2, type H - 420 kV, 2000 A - SF6 circuit breaker, Q1, type HPL - 420 kV, 3150 A - current instrument transformer, Tc, type SAS - 420 kV, 1200/1/1/1/1 A - voltage instrument transformer, Tt, type TEVF, 400/0.1/3 kV - feeder disconnector, Q9, type H - 420 kV, 2000 A - shunt reactor, type DFAL 400 kV, 144 A, 100 MVAr, connection YN, impedance Z = 1576 - ZnO surge arrester, type EXLIM P 336-EH 420. The measurement diagram is the same as in the previous case. A. The measurement and recording results

Table II. Test results for the switching over-voltages of the shunt reactor controlled by SF6 circuit breaker with (tests 1-3) and without (tests 4-6) the synchronize switching device Switchsync F236 There were made 6 opening operations (3 with synchronize switching device, and 3 without synchronize switching device), on 400 kV shunt reactor circuit breaker on 45el. shift. The 8

disconnection of the shunt reactor was made especially at 0el., 45el. and 90el., which were considered the most important moments for a comparative recording of the switching over-voltages. The test results are presented in the Table II. The arrangement of the data from the PC was made using a LABVIEW program, and the data from the oscillographes was made using calibration constants. The oscillogram from the test no. 2 is presented in Fig. 8. This oscillogram was realized using the analog system. The oscillogram from the test no. 5 is presented in Fig. 9. This oscillogram was realized using the digital system.

Figure 8. The oscillogram from the test no. 2, with the synchronize switching device SWITCHSYNC F235, using the analog system.

Figure 9. The oscillogram from the test no. 5, without the synchronize switching device SWITCHSYNC F235, using the digital system.

7. CONCLUSIONS In case of high voltage shunt reactor controlled by live-tank oil circuit breaker, the disconnections of the high voltage shunt reactor was followed by chopping currents and repeated re-ignitions on each circuit breaker phases, which is not allowed in operation. The maximum over-voltage was recorded on phase R at a value of 574.1 kV (k = 2.23 2.4 as in IEC 1233/1999). We can observe a large dispersion of the chopping currents which can bring to bigger overvoltages much more than those measured by tests. So, it is obvious that the live-tank oil circuit breaker had to be replaced with another circuit breaker with better performances. In case of high voltage shunt reactors controlled by SF6 circuit breaker with or without the synchronize switching device the maximum over-voltages was recorded on phase T at a value of 458.9 kV (k = 1.89), with SWITCHSYNC F236, and at a value of 541 kV (k= 2.29), without SWITCHSYNC F236. The SWITCHSYNC F236 allows the disconnection at phase position, so the switching overvoltages are smaller. So, the replacement of the live-tank oil circuit breaker with a SF6 circuit breaker without, and especially with the synchronize switching device was efficient. 8. BIBLIOGRAPHY

[1] S. Berneryd, "Switching of shunt reactors Comparison between field and laboratory tests," in Proc. 1974 CIGRE Conf., paper 13-04. [2] P. C. Stroica, "Modern methods for synchronous switching of circuit breakers in 400 kV substations of the Romanian Power System," in Proc. 2000 MELECON Conf., pp. 949953. [3] R. Alvinsson, "Controlled switching of circuit breakers: A technology status review," in ABB switchgear AB, BC 96-027, pp. 1-25.

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