This work takes place in the context of distribution power system protection and tries to improve the detection and location of earth faults. The protection problem is vast and many ideas emerge every year to enhance the reliability of the grid. The author has focused his energy into the compensated and isolated network protection in the specific case of single phase earth fault. This PhD thesis is divided in two main parts that might be considered as independent. The first part studies the detection of single phase earth fault and the second analyzes the fault location of such fault.<p><p>Pragmatism was asked during these three years because a product development was necessary especially regarding the fault detection problem. The first part of the thesis took 18 months of research and development to obtain a prototype of transient protection able to detect single phase earth fault in compensated and isolated network. The sensitivity of the algorithm has been emphasized regarding the fault impedance and to detect earth fault up to 5 kOhm depending on the network characteristic. The fault location problem has been much more theoretical although the problem links to the accuracy of the algorithm and its robustness regarding wrong fault location indication has been strongly considered.<p><p>Compensated networks and in some conditions isolated networks are distribution from 12 kV up to 110 kV mostly used in East and North Europe but also in China. Others areas also work with such networks but they also have others systems and they do not use them on all the territory. These networks have the particularity to obtain very small fault current in case of single phase earth fault. Low current means the difference between a faulty and a sound feeder is not significant. Therefore classic overcurrent protection is completely useless to protect the network, forcing the development of more complex algorithm. A possibility to overcome the problem of the small fault current is to develop a transient protection. The transient occurring at the beginning of the fault has strong information to distinguish a faulty from a sound feeder. In this work I have chosen to use not only the transient but also the steady state to get the best sensitivity.<p><p>Then the fault location has been investigated but the small information coming from the faulty feeder is not sufficient to have a precise enough position of the fault. Therefore, active system has been suggested to be implemented in the grid to increase the faulty current and have enough power for a precise location. Different existing algorithms based on the steady state at the nominal frequency are compared using a tool developed during this work. Recommendations are then made depending on the topology, the network parameters, the measurements precision, etc. Due to the complexities of the problem, a simulator has been coded in Matlab .The user of a possible fault location must then use this tool to understand and see the future fault location precision that he could obtain from different algorithm on his network. / Doctorat en Sciences de l'ingénieur / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Reliability requirements for power systems have been constantly increasing, as customers of electric power desire high power availability. In order to improve continuity of supply in medium voltage (MV) networks, utilities in many countries in Europe, North/South America and Oceania use resonant earthing and allow the operation of the network during a single phasetoearth fault for periods from several seconds up to several hours, since the earthfault current at the fault point in such systems is considerably reduced and is unlikely to damage equipment or create hazardous voltages for people or livestock. Due to the neutral potential displacement during the phasetoearth fault, the healthy phases can rise up to 1.73 times the nominal values in the entire network, overstressing insulation and increasing the probability of a second fault from another phasetoearth fault somewhere in the network. The situation of two simultaneously active phasetoearth faults on different phases at different locations in a network is commonly called a crosscountry or doubleearth fault. The current through the earth then becomes many times higher than in case of a single phasetoearth fault in a resonantearthed network. Few studies about CrossCountry faults in MV systems have been done so far, particularly with real fault data and simulations. This thesis has as main objectives to: improve understanding of how crosscountry faults behave in resonantearthed systems; show how the double fault situation can be analytically calculated; and study what difficulties these faults can pose to traditional distance protection. This is done by: analyzing recordings of real faults, obtained from utilities in Scandinavia; modelling the fault situations analytically; simulating such systems with real system data; and examining in particular how faultedphase selection and distance protection behave during these faults. The developed mathematical model was compared with a simple simulated system. The results showed that the modelling produces accurate results. Analysis of the real faults showed that crosscountry faults cannot be equated directly to more traditional singlephase or doublephase faults on particular feeders, since voltages and currents can behave in atypical manners. Finally, during the comprehensive simulations of such network, limitations of traditional distance protection were identified. Phasetophase loops can face difficulties in properly detecting crosscountry faults even when one of the two simultaneous faults is relatively close to the measuring point. Phasetoearth loops can only be reliable when faults are solid or with very low resistance and in conditions where zero sequence current is present, while for multiple infeeds can also face difficulties. / Kraven på elkraftsystemets pålitlighet ökar hela tiden, då kundernas krav på tillgänglighet hela tiden stiger. Som ett led i att förbättra leveranssäkerheten på mellanspänningsnivån har ett flertal elnätsbolag i Europa, Nord och Sydamerika samt Oceanien börjat använda spoljordning. Genom detta kan jordfel under drift tillåtas, på allt ifrån sekundbasis till timmar. På detta sätt undviks driftavbrott vid jordfel. Spoljordning gör att jordfelsströmmen reduceras vilket minimerar risken för person, djur och egendomsskador. Under ett enfasigt jordfel höjs spänningen i de två opåverkade faserna till maximalt 1.73 gånger den nominella spänningen, detta i hela det aktuella nätet. Spänningshöjningen riskerar att ge skador på isolaringen, vilket gör att risken för uppkomsten av ett andra jordfel någonstans i samma nätavsnitt ökar. Att två enfasiga jordfel på olika platser inträffar samtidigt i samma nät, kallas dubbelt jordfel, på engelska crosscountry fault. Strömmen genom jord i ett spoljordat nät blir i detta fallet mycket högre än för ett enfasigt jordfel. Än så länge har bara ett fåtal studier med verkliga data och simuleringar gällande dubbla jordfel på mellanspänningsnivå utförts. Detta examensarbete syftar till att: förbättra förståelsen för hur dubbla jordfel uppkommer i spoljordade nät; beskriva hur dubbla jordfel kan beräknas analytiskt; och visa på vilka svårigheter dubbla jordfel kan ge för distansskydd. Detta görs genom: att analysera verkliga fel uppkomna i Skandinavien; analytisk modellering av dessa situationer; simulering med data från verkliga elnät; undersökning av hur felbehäftade delar och dess distansskydd beter sig vid fel. Den utvecklade matematiska modelleringsmetoden är jämförd med ett enkelt system som var simulerat, och resultaten av jämförelsen visar att modellen ger ett överensstämmande och noggrant resultat. Analysen av verkliga fel visar att dubbla jordfel inte direkt kan likställas med traditionella enfas- eller tvåfasfel för ett och samma utgående fack, då spänning och strömmar kan ha olika beteende. Avslutningsvis kunde begränsningar hos traditionella distansskydd upptäckas, tack var en omfattande simulering av nyss nämnda elnät. Fas- fas slingan kan se svårigheter att detektera dubbla fel även när ett av dessa två är nära till mätpunkten. Fas- jord slingan är endast pålitlig när felresistansen är försumbar, eller i fall där felresistansen är låg, samt i fall när nollföljdsströmmen är närvarande. Flera felströmsinmatningar kan likaså ställa till svårigheter.

This master´s thesis deals with the indication and localization of earth faults in overhead lines. Earth fault is the most frequently occurring type of fault in medium voltage overhead lines – it covers approx. 95% of all faults and is very difficult to indicate and localize them correctly and in time with currently available methods on the market. Therefore is very important to study earth fault and its indication, localization. The thesis consists of a theoretical and a practical part. The theoretical part deals with faults in overhead networks with different type of neutral grounding, mainly with one phase to the ground fault in the compensated, ungrounded, solidly grounded and via resistance grounded networks. Most of the theoretical part is dedicated to one phase to the ground fault in the compensated and ungrounded networks, where this type fault is called the earth fault. In the compensated and ungrounded networks is described in details behavior – voltage and current relations during both steady state and transient state earth fault. The theoretical part is further dedicated to detection methods of earth faults and their preconditions for use. There is described also in details the complete procedure of earth fault detection, which includes indication, unhealthy feeder determination and exact position or line section localization. End of the theoretical part is then focused on determination of accuracy requirements for measurement of basic quantities and computation of other parameters. The practical part deals with a work at medium distribution network model, which includes familiarization with the model, detailed verification of its functionality and behavior during the earth fault, obtaining faults records and algorithmization of methods: method of qu – diagram and method of first half - period, which are able to detect unhealthy feeder. This part of the thesis was put together based on a demand of company Mega, corp., which wanted to verify function of both above mentioned and by them not yet tested methods.