Intermittent transient earth fault

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Scope

• Electrical tree
• Water tree
• Intermittent transient erath fault
• Currents and voltages in transient earth fault
• Detection of intermittent transient earth fault
• Protection co-ordination
• Transient e/f protection stage setting
• Examples (disturbance recordings)

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Electrical tree

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Electrical tree

• A tree –like (partial) discharge structure in insulation material

• Presence of water is not needed
• Develops relatively fast
• Electrical tree development started inside insulation material may
stop without developing to surface of insulation material

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Electrical tree
Electrical tree development

Sheath
• Electrica tree development can start due to various reasons. Tree hole

development can start on insulation boundary layer, inside insulation

Electrical tree
material due to contaminant, void or inhomogeneity, for example.
Water tree

• Development of electrical tree is also associated to Void Protrusion

electromechanical forces (mechanical stress due to alternatign

Insulation Crack
electric field) and/or to chemical stress (water and other chemicals) jacket hole

• Electrical tree can be bow-tie, meaning that electrical tree is buried

Contaminant
inside of insulation material. Another form of electrical tree is vented,
Conductor shield
meaning that electrical three opens to surface of insulation material. interruption
Bridging tree

Delamination
Sheath Corroded
crack neutral

Typical power cable defects

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 Sheath
hole

Electrical tree

Water tree

Void Protrusion

Insulation Crack
jacket hole

Contaminant

Conductor shield
interruption

Bridging tree

Sheath Corroded
crack Delamination neutral

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Typical power cable defects
Electrical tree
Electrical tree developes relatively fast

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Electrical tree
Development of electrical tree in acrylic due to injection of charge carriers (electrons)

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Electrical tree
Bush –type electrical tree

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Water tree

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Water tree

• A plume alike structure of very fine water filled discharge channels in

insulation material
• As name implies, water tree will only develop in presence of water.
Water can exist in liquid state or in molecular state
• Water tree progression is not as fast as development of electrical
tree
• Usually water tree start to develop from sheath damage

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Water tree
Once water tree is developed progression of electric tree is likely

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Cable fault
Every cloud has....

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Electric art
…a silver lining

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Intermittent transient earth fault

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Intermittent transient earth fault

500
• Intermittent transient e/f is self extinguishing low impedance 400
EFtransientFig2

I0 amplitude (A)
fault with characteristic charging and discharging current 300

transients 200

100

• Several different expressions are used on transient e/f. At least 0

0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
the following expressions can be found, intermittent earth fault, Time (ms)

transient intermittent e/f, transient e/f, re-striking fault... A typical I0 pulse

• Intermittent e/f can be a bit misleading expression as there are

other earth faults that has intermittent nature without
characteristic current transient. A three touching o/h line for
example.

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Intermittent transient earth fault

• Typically (or solely) intermittent transient earth fault occurs in

compensated network
• Often transient earth fault is considered as cable or cable
network fault but in fact it may occur may in all kind of
compensated networks and virtually in every network
component.
• Intermittent transient earth fault is simply self extinguishing
arcing earth fault

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Intermittent transient earth fault

• Use of plastic material as cable insulator started to become

come common in sixties. Earlier oil impregnated paper was
used in cable insulation.
• Especially early XLPE cables had tendency of water tree
development
• Due to improvements in plastic materials and manufacturing
proccesses XLPE cables of today are less sensitive for water
tree development

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Intermittent transient earth fault

• As result of water ingress to cable water tree is developed and

later electrical tree as well resulting arcing earth fault within the
cable.
• Common misconception is idea of water evaporation due to
arcing fault. Water evaporation doesn’t have role in arc
extinguishing but arc is extinguished as result of suppression
coils (compensation).

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Intermittent transient earth fault

• Intermittent transient earth fault is not solely a cable fault but it

ca take place in any network component, like insulator for
example.
• Necessity for intermittent transient earth fault is high network
capacitance (often in cable network) and use of compensation
coil

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Voltages and currents of intermittent transient earth fault

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Voltages and currents of intermittent transient earth fault
Residual current and zero sequence voltage

• Transient earth fault is self

Compensation degree of 100% extinguishing fault that re-strikes
again and again
EFtransientFig4
I0FaultyFeeder • Characteristic feature of transient
earth fault is very high current
transient with very short duration
I0HealthyFeeder • Frequency of fault transient
depend of size of network
(capacitance) and compensation
degree
U0

0 50 100 150 200

Time (ms)

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Voltages and currents of intermittent transient earth fault
Typical Io transient current
500 EFtransientFig2

400
• Typical duration of transient pulse
I0 amplitude (A)

is from some hundred micro

300 second to one millisecond

200 • Current transient is caused by

(capacitor) discharge current of
100 faulty phase and charge currents
of healthy phases
0
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Time (ms)

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Voltages and currents of intermittent transient earth fault
Phase voltages and Io and Uo

Compensation degree of 100% • Voltage in faulty phase drops to

EFtransientFig3 zero and healthy phase voltages
UL1
jumps to level of main voltage

• Change in voltages causes

UL2 discharge and charge currents in
phases

• After extinguishing of fault phase

UL3
voltages will return to normal and
Uo diminishes

I0 • Voltage raise rate depends on

network size and compensation
degree therefore occurrence
U0
frequency of fault transient
depend also on network size and
compensation degree
0 50 100 150 200
Time (ms)

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Voltages and currents of intermittent transient earth fault
Effect of compencation degree
EFtransientFig5
I0FaultyFeeder
• Size of network and compensation
degree determines voltage raise
I0HealthyFeeder rate and occurrence frequency of
30% fault transient

U0

0 50 100 150 200

Time (ms)

EFtransientFig6
I0FaultyFeeder

170% I0HealthyFeeder

U0

0 50 100 150 200

Time (ms)

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Detection of intermittent transient earth fault

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Determination of intermittent transient earth fault
Sampling rate

500 EFtransientFig2 • VAMP relay sampling rate is 32

sampes / cycle (625 us). Sampling
400 rate is represented by red lines in
I0 amplitude (A)

the graph
300
• As the sampling rate is not
200 sufficient there is additional
circuitry to make reliable detection
100 of current transient

0 • Due to too low sampling rate

current transient are not always
0.0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1.0
Time (ms) visible in disturbance recordings

• Sampling rate has to be in range

on 10kHz for reliable direct
determination of current
transients

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Determination of intermittent transient earth fault
Determination of current transient
Transient earth fault. File tu_c100r0000_ff

Tullinge, Ruotsi abs max Uo = 129 Vpeak • Direction of Io and Uo are related
Kompensaatioaste ~ 100 %
Uo to direction of fault. A correlation
signal is calculated which is
proportional to fault direction
abs max Io = 7.9 Apeak

Io

dUo

dUohp

-Iohp

Correlation

Pick up
Correlation = -809 ... 13640

-0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15

Time (s)
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Transienttimaasulun havaitseminen
Direction of current transient

Transient earth fault. File jk_c170r0004_ff Transient earth fault. File jk_c170r0004_hf

abs max Uo = 142 Vpeak abs max Uo = 142 Vpeak

Faulty feeder Healthy feeder
Uo Uo

abs max Io = 16.8 Apeak abs max Io = 2.6 Apeak

Io Io

dUo dUo

dUohp dUohp

-Iohp -Iohp

Correlation Correlation

Pick up Pick up
Correlation = -2044 ... 106309 Correlation = -33611 ... 0

-0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15 -0.05 0 0.05 0.1 0.15

Time (s) Time (s)

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 Transient earth fault. File jk_c170r0004_ff
Transienttimaasulun havaitseminen
Transientin suunta (vikaantunut lähtö ja terve lähtö) abs max Uo = 142 Vpeak

Uo

abs max Io = 16.8 Apeak

I0PEAK
Io
√2 I0_50HzRMS

dUo
Correlation > 0
AND ⇒ Pick up dUohp
I0PEAK > √2 I0_50HzRMS
-Iohp

Correlation

Confidential Property of Schneider Electric | Page 30 Pick up

Correlation = -2044 ... 106309
Co-ordination of protection stages

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Protection stage co-ordination with transient e/f stage
Use of transient e/f protection stage with o/h line and in mixed network (o/h line + cable)

• Transient e/f stage doesn’t detect permanent e/f.

• Transient e/f stage may not detect arcing fault if network has
low capacitance (o/h line) and when arc has long length (higer
resistance).
• Transient earth fault stage is never sufficient alone. It has to be
used together with traditional e/f protection stage
• Auto re-close can be used with Io stage
• Operation time of transient e/f should be between that of Io
stage and Uo stage. This prevents Uo tripping in case
intermittent transient e/f. Transient e/f stage can (temporarily)
block Io stage (prevent of false direction detection)

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Protection stage co-ordination with transient e/f stage
Use of transient e/f protection stage in cable network

• Transient e/f stage doesn’t detect permanent e/f.

• Transient e/f stage may not detect arcing fault if network has
low capacitance (o/h line) and when arc has long length (higer
resistance).
• Transient earth fault stage is never sufficient alone. It has to be
used together with traditional e/f protection stage
• Use of auto re-close is not recommended in cable network
• Operation time of transient e/f should be clearly shorter that
than of Uo stage (to prevent false Uo tripping).
• Transient e/f stage can temporarily block Io stage (prevent of
false direction detection)

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Setting of intermittent transient e/f stage

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Setting of intermittent transient e/f stage
After firmware versions 10.151

Enagle stage

Used Io channel

Direction control

Uo setting

Operation delay

Number of current transients

Control pulse length (trip pulse)

(Setting name is very misleading)

Intermittent time (stage reset time)

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Operation of intermittent transient e/f stage
After firmware versions 10.151

Intermittent time – 0,2s

• The first transient starts stage
Operation delay – 0,16s
• The second transient fulfills (firts) trip
criteria (number of transients)
Number of transients – 2
• Trip activated when trip delay is elapsed
Trip pulse length – 0,1s
(second trip criteria)

• Length of trip pulse is 0.1s

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Operation of intermittent transient e/f stage
After firmware versions 10.151
Intermittent time – 0,2s
• The first transient starts stage
Operation delay – 0,16s
• The second transients re-starts
Number of transients – 3 intermittent time counter
Trip pulse length – 0,1s • Operation delay elapsed but trip signal is
not initiated as required number of
transients is not detected yet

• The 3th transient detected within

intermittent time. Trip signal is initieted
as both criteria are met (number of
transients and trip time)

• Length of trip pulse is 0.1s

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Operation of intermittent transient e/f stage
After firmware versions 10.151
Intermittent time – 0,2s
• The first transient starts stage
Operation delay – 0,3s
• The second transient detected within
Number of transients – 2 intermittent time. Intermittent time
counter is restarted
Trip pulse length – 0,1s
• Trip signal is not initiated before trim
timer is elapsed

• Intermittent time elapsed withou

toccurrence of transient resulting stage
reset

This example shows importance of

intermittent time counter. Intermittent time
counter is really the only way to reset stage
when fault diappears.

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Recommended settings
After firmware versions 10.151

Required number of transients, 2

• As (low impedance) permanent earth faults starts with current
transient it is recommended to wait for second current transients in
order to make sure intermittent fault is detected
Intermittent time, 1s
• In correctly compensated network occurrence of transient can be as
sparse as half a second therefore intermittent time of one second is
recommended.
Correctly chosen intermittent time doesn’t have effect in operation
delay.
Operation delay
• Consider proper co-ordination of Io, Uo and transient e/f stages.
Operation delay of transient e/f stage should be shorter than
intermittent time.
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Setting of intermittent transient e/f stage
Prior to firmware version 10.151

Enable stage

Select Io channel

Uo setting

Operation delay

Required number of transients

(non settable parameter)

Intermittent time

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Operation of intermittent transient e/f stage
Prior to firmware version 10.151

• Only operation delay can be set. Required

number of transient is related to
operation time by assuming transient
occur once in every 20ms

• Stage is rested if no transient occur

within intermittent tim

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Real life examples

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Example 1
Earth fault test in compensated cable network. Fault is made by using a spark gap

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Example 2
Broken insulator on top of transformer. Fully compensated cable network

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 THANK YOU.

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