POWER SWING DETECTION / TRIP TESTING IN IEDS

USING SMART TESTING METHODOLOGY

K.N. Dinesh Babu Salman Khan

Sr Application Engineer Application Engineer
Megger Megger
Dineshbabu.nagalingam@megger.com Salman.khan@megger.com

ABSTRACT : Power swing which is principally caused by an oscillation in active and reactive power of
transmission line, consequent to an enormous disruption in power system, which if not blocked, could cause
wrong operation to the distance relay which may lead to tripping the healthy part of the transmission line. In the
absence of power swing function it may result in severe damage to the machines or cascading tripping in the
grid resulting in blackouts. To prevent such scenarios, intelligent electronic devices (IEDs) have power swing
block (PSB) detection and trip logics incorporated with distance schemes. This logic provides severe challenges
to T&C engineers, where the conventional methods of using several states and multiple configuration steps
while testing the IEDs complicates the process of testing. Further, the variations in logics due to manufacturer
specific algorithm add to the complications. To address such complications, a new testing philosophy has been
developed in, where PSB, PSD and PST functionality testing methodology and detailed discussion on the
oscillography file is explained in this paper.

Keywords—Power swing detection, power swing trip, power swing block, distance protection, intelligent
electronic device (IED)

I. INTRODUCTION
Impedance protection relays are embedded with additional security features such as power swing, load
encroachment, auto reclose, phase selection etc… to ensure guaranteed operation of the relay during stable and
unstable conditions. Unstable conditions may arise during sudden addition or removal of loads in power system
network, which may result in variation in impedance and fluctuation of the impedance locus, causing the
impedance protection relay to trip. Such a trip may be undesirable as load variation in power system is not a
fault. On the other hand, during a fault, the impedance read by the relay would be similar to a power swing and
hence blocking of a relay for load variations may not meet the requirement. To meet the requirement, it is
mandatory to differentiate load variations and fault conditions hence IEDs are equipped with a secured
algorithm called as power swing detection (PSD) and blocking the zones of protection which is termed as power
swing blocking (PSB). PSB may block the relay during a rare situation where the power swing is followed by a
fault. During such scenarios, the relay would inhibit the PSB feature and would trip for the fault which is
termed as power sing trip (PST). These features have to be properly configured and co-ordinated to ensure
proper operation of the relay. The proper operation is verified by testing methodology involving dedicated
modules developed in megger make smart megger relay tester (SMRT) which is explained in this paper. In this
paper, section 2 talks about the configuration made in an ABB make REL670 relay with detailed description on
the blinder values and conversion formulas. Section 3 explains the power sing locus which is used to test this
functionality. Section 4 talks about the settings adapted in the power swing module. Analysis on the tripping of
the oscillography is explained in section5. Section 6, 7 and 8 discusses the power sing trip feature where a
power swing followed by a zone 2 fault is discussed and concludes the paper.

II. POWER SWING CONFIGURATION IN DISTANCE PROTECTION RELAY

Figure 1 shows the power swing configuration in an Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) make Distance protection relay
where the blinder characteristics are displayed in brown colour [1]. The configured power swing settings, such
as ZMRPSB[1] leads to 96.6 𝝮, which can be observed in the ‘Graphical presentation’ tab available in the
PCM600 software which is used to configure this relay.
 Figure1: Distance protection IED – Power swing characteristics

The relay is configured in primary values and hence formulas to convert the values to secondary are explained
in equations (1) to equations (6). With these equations, the power swing blinder value of 27.78 𝝮 is
determined and the same is displayed in red font in Figure1.

2000
𝐶𝑇𝑅 = = 2000 ----------eq(1)
1

765000
𝑃𝑇𝑅 = = 6954.54 ----------eq(2)
110

𝐶𝑇𝑅 2000
= 6954.54 = 0.2875 ----------eq(3)
𝑃𝑇𝑅

𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐵𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑃𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑦 = 96.6 𝞨 ----------eq(4)

𝐶𝑇𝑅
𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐵𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑆𝑒𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑦 = 𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐵𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑃𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑦 × 𝑃𝑇𝑅 ----------eq(5)

𝑃𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑆𝑤𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝐵𝑙𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑒𝑟𝑆𝑒𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑑𝑎𝑟𝑦 = 96.6 × 0.2875 = 27.78 𝞨 ----------eq(6)

With the availability of the power swing values and an understanding on the characteristics, the power swing
module in SMRT test kit can be configured which is explained in the next section.

III. POWER SWING LOCUS FOR PSD

The power swing locus implemented in the relay test management software (RTMS) which is used to control the
SMRT test set is shown in Figure 2 [2]. The values calculated in section II, and the zone values from the IED,
are used in this drawing to better understand the testing methodology. The power swing locus is designed with
three values such as the ZMax ,ZMin ,ZMid as shown below. The ZMax value has to be configured approximately
more than 1𝝮 of the power swing outer blinder, which leads to nearly 29𝝮. The ZMin value should be less than
the blinder and greater than the zone 2 resistive right blinder value in order to obtain a detection of power swing
without a zone encroachment. As the Zone2 resistive reach is 8.63𝝮, the ZMin value is configured at 10𝝮. The
ZMid value should be configured within the blinder value but should not be same as the Z Min. Hence a value of
14𝝮 has been considered approximately.
 Figure2: Power Sing Locus in RTMS software

Based on the rules discussed above, the values are achieved and the power swing locus drawing is arrived.
These values need to be configured in the RTMS screen which is explained in the next section.

IV. POWER SWING TESTING MODULE CONFIGURATION IN SMRT

The configuration window of Power swing module in RTMS software is shown in Figure 3. Explanation on the
‘Global’ window tab and ‘Swing’ window tab is tableted in table 1. The ZMax ,ZMin ,ZMid values are configured in
the ‘Swing’ window as per the calculations made earlier. The ‘duration’ value in ‘swing’ window is the product
of ‘period’ in the ‘global’ window and ‘turns’ in the ‘swing’ window. On completion of these configurations,
the graphical display of the waveform is also displayed for visualization.

Figure3: RTMS Power Swing settings

The ‘pre-fault’ duration is the value entered in the ‘Period’ tab which is displayed in the graphical window as
the first black cursor. The total duration of the test case would be the sum of the ‘duration’ tab and the ‘pre-
fault’ tab which sums to eight seconds in this case. The second cursor is the ‘pre-fault’ duration summed with
half of the post-fault duration. In this specific case, this value is calculated as 4 + (4/2) = 6(s).

Table1: Explanation for Power swing settings

Global Window
Frequency (Hz) : Nominal System Frequency in Hertz
Voltage : Nominal Line to Ground System Secondary Voltage (V)
Period : Time Period of one complete power swing in seconds (s) This setting will be used
 to calculate the Global Pre-Fault time in seconds, as well as the Duration time in
seconds in the Swing Window.
Setting Time : This is the operating time of the relay in seconds. This setting will be used in the
Results window to set the default Min and Max time evaluation values (± 5%).
Note that the Min and Max values can be manually changed in the Results window.
Swing Window
Turns : The number of times that the power swing will repeat around Zmid and Zmin.
Zmin : The minimum of the impedance locus (Ohms)
Zmid : This is the second maximum impedance during the power swing (Ohms)
Zmax : This is the starting impedance of the power swing (Ohms)

On successful completion of the configuration, the play button on the top right corner of Figure 3 can be pressed
to create the power swing condition in the relay by injecting the respective values in the IED. The IED is
configured to record the oscillograph file and hence the simulated values are recorded in the IED which is
downloaded for further analysis which is detailed in the next section.
V. OSCILLOGRAPH FILE ANALYSIS FOR POWER SWING DETECTION
Oscillograph files commonly known as comtrade files are standard files formulated by power system relaying
committee (PSRC) and its complied to IEEE C37.111 [3]. Files complied to this standard will record the analog
and digital values in the IED and can be analysed using any software which is capable of handling this format.
Such a file which has recorded the power sing scenario in REL670 IED has been retrieved and the same is
analysed using UR setup software of GE [4] which is shown in Figure 4.

Figure4: Comtrade file showing Power Swing Detection for settings in Figure 2 & 3

Both the digital and analog values can be observed in this figure and we can find that the PSB detect has picked
up at the point where the red cursor is placed. The green cursor shown is placed at the point where the PSB
function has dropped off. The difference between these two cursors is shown in the yellow tab in the top which
displays 2 (s). This analysis confirms proper operation of the IED as the timer is in line with the configuration.
In addition to this verification, it can also be observed that no zones have picked up since we have configured
the ZMin outside the outermost zone of the IED. In this manner, the pickup of the PSD function has been
verified, however to verify the proper operation of the timer and the zone tripping and blocking logic, the
settings are modified and re-tested as discussed in the following section.

VI. POWER SWING LOCUS FOR PST

The power swing characteristics to test the power sing block feature along with tripping of zone 2 is plotted as
shown in Figure 5. The ZMin settings are configured to ensure that the locus enters the zone 2 impedance
 settings, which should be less than 8.63𝝮 in this case.

Figure5: Comtrade file showing Power Swing Detection with Zone 2 Trip

The ZMin is chosen such that is lies outside zone 1 and inside the zone which needs to be tested. Configuration
of these values in RTMS is discussed in the next section.

VII. POWER SWING SETTINGS FOR PST

The power swing setting configuration in RTMS software is shown in Figure 6, where the Z Min settings are
configured for 6 𝝮 where the characteristics locus would be in line with Figure 5.

Figure6: RTMS settings for Power Swing Detection with Zone 2 Trip

On successful completion of the configuration, the play button on the top right corner of Figure 6 can be pressed
to create the power swing condition in the relay by injecting the respective values in the IED. The oscillograph
file of the IED is downloaded for further analysis which is detailed in the next section.
VIII. OSCILLOGRAPH FILE ANALYSIS FOR POWER SWING TRIP
The Oscillograph file of the REL670 relay which has responded to the power swing condition simulated in the
previous section is shown in Figure 7. The red cursor in the file is placed at the point where PSB function has
picked up and the green cursor shown is placed at the point where Zone 2 has operated.
 Figure7: Comtrade file showing Power Swing Detection followed by Zone2 trip

The difference between these two cursors is shown in the yellow tab in the top which displays 2.35 (s). The trip
time of zone 2 configured in the IED accounts to 350 ms which when added to the PSB timer of 2 (s) results in
2.35 (s). This analysis confirms proper operation of the IED for PSB, zone1 non operation and zone 2 tripping
along with timer. In similar line, any zone can be tested and verified my modifying the ZMin settings in co-
ordination with the pilot aided schemes [5]

IX. CONCLUSION
Power swing testing in IEDs in conjunction with protection schemes increases the complexity in testing due to
the various timers and impedance boundaries associated with the protection features. Conventional method of
testing involves configuring of several stages in order to move the impedance locus from various points to the
internal areas of power swing characterises and zone characteristics. Such methods involve huge configuration
time and rigours optimization in the timers. This method of testing can be eliminated by the use of automated
test modules where the operation of power swing, pick up and operate of zone times etc… can be easily tested in
few simple steps as described in the paper.

X. REFERENCE
[1] ABB REL670 manual, Document ID 1MRK506312-UEN, Chapter 6.11
[2] Power DB user manual, Revision14, ECN22489 dated 11/14/2017
[3] C37.111-1999 - IEEE Standard Common Format for Transient Data Exchange (COMTRADE) for Power
Systems
[4] www.gegridsolutions.com, Enervista UR setup version, Version 7.32 (Accessed on 29/10/2016)
[5] C37.113-2015 - IEEE Guide for Protective Relay Applications to Transmission Lines