Lecture 11th

Generator Protection

Course Teacher:
Dr. Muhammad Mohsin Aman
Course Code:
EE-523
Venue:
Computer Laboratory, Department of Electrical Engineering ,
NED University Karachi.
11th Lecture’s Outline
11th Lecture’s Outline
 Generator Protection
 Electrical Circuit of the Generator
 Various Faults and Abnormal Operating Conditions
 Transverse Differential Protection
 Limitation of Differential Protection
 Problems
 Rotor Faults
Generator Protection
Generator Protection
•A generator could be part of:
 water turbine based hydropower station
 gas turbine based power station
 steam turbine based thermal power station
 nuclear power station
•In all the above installations, the protection of the generator presents a
very challenging problem because of its system connections on three different
sides as shown in Figure 8.1.
Generator Protection
•On the one side, it is connected to the prime mover and on the other side, it
has to run in synchronism with the grid because of its connection to the power
system.
•On yet another (third) side, it is connected to the source of DC excitation.
•It is thus obvious that generator protection is very complex compared to
protection for other elements of the power system.
Generator Protection
•We will restrict ourselves to various aspects of protection of a large (200
MW or higher) steam turbine based turbo-alternator.
•In case of a fault on a turbo-alternator, it is not enough to open the main
circuit connecting it to the power grid. For example, when a turbo-alternator
driven by team turbine is tripped, the following must be done:
 Steam supply to the turbine is stopped or bypassed.
 Firing of the boiler is stopped.
 Coal mills are stopped.
 Coal supply to the coal mills is stopped.
 Field circuit of the alternator is interrupted.
 Field coils are connected across a resistor to dissipate the stored energy.
 Alternator is kept running at a slow speed (few rpm) with the help of barring
gear till it cools down uniformly, so as to avoid uneven expansions.
Generator Protection
•Putting back the alternator on line is rather a slow process because all the
parameters (temperatures and pressures) have to be progressively built up to
avoid thermal shock resulting in uneven expansions which might cause
unacceptable vibrations. Therefore, unscheduled outage of a thermal power
station is avoided as far as possible.
•We have to keep in mind that a modern large turbo-alternator is a huge
mass rotating at a very high speed (3000 rpm) in a very small air-gap. Thus, apart
from the large electrical energies involved, there is tremendous amount of
mechanical energy in the form of moment of inertia of the rotating mass and
resultant forces on the shaft, the rotor body and the stator structure.
Generator Protection
•Thus, any slight increase in temperature or uneven heating of the rotor may
cause eccentricity, which gets accentuated because of the high speed of rotation
and small air-gap. The entire system has, therefore, to be run in a narrow range of
various parameters like temperatures and pressures, displacements, flows,
voltages, currents, power factor, and so forth. The operation outside the specified
parameter range may cause a substantial decrease in the life of the equipment.
•Since the power station equipment represents a very high investment of
money, the operation of the power plant is very closely monitored and controlled.
•Figure 8.2 illustrates the complexities of a turbo-alternator in a more
detailed manner. It is said that running a large power station is like flying a
supersonic jet aircraft! without any forced landings or crashes!
Generator Protection
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Electrical Circuit of the Generator
Electrical Circuit of the Generator
•The electrical circuit of
the generator is very simple in
spite of the complexity of the
overall system.
•This is shown in Figures
8.3(a), 8.3(b) and 8.3(c). It is to
be noted that the generator is
newer solidly grounded.
Electrical Circuit of the Generator
•If it were solidly grounded, the single line-to-ground fault current would be
dangerously high. Apart from the high value of fault current, the resulting
asymmetry in the rotating magnetic field inside the generator would cause
unacceptably large vibrations and result in mechanical damage to the rotor. Hence
in order to limit the short circuit current, the neutral of the generator is grounded
through a resistance.
•In order to get a practicable value of the grounding resistor, it is connected
through a step-down transformer, known as grounding transformer.
Electrical Circuit of the Generator
•The rotor of the generator houses the field winding. A separate dc generator,
which is mounted on the turbo-alternator shaft, feeds the field. The dc system is
kept floating with respect to the ac ground, i.e. neither the +ve nor the -ve terminal
is grounded. The field interrupter and the arrangement for field suppression is also
shown in Figure 8.3(c).
Various Faults and Abnormal Operating
Conditions
Various Faults and Abnormal Operating Conditions
•In addition various electrical faults, a generator goes through many
abnormal operating conditions, which need to be understood. Figure 8.4(a) and
Figure 8.4(b) show the hierarchy of the electrical faults and abnormal operating
conditions.
Stator Faults
•The three-phase armature winding on the stator can develop phase as well as
ground faults. Another possibility is inter-turn faults between turns of the same
phase.
Stator Phase and Ground Faults
•Phase and ground faults on the stator armature winding can be easily
detected by a conventional percentage differential protection scheme as shown in
Figure 8.5.
•This type of scheme is also known as longitudinal differential scheme in
order to differentiate it from another differential scheme, known as transverse
differential scheme which is used to detect inter-turn faults.
Stator Phase and Ground Faults
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Stator Phase and Ground Faults
•It may be noted that there are differences between the differential protection
of a power transformer and that of a generator as shown in Table 8.1. As a result of
these differences, the percentage bias setting for the generator differential relay is
quite small compared to that for the power transformer.
Stator Phase and Ground Faults
•This gives rise to a larger spill current, during normal load and external
faults, in case of the transformer differential protection than in case of the
generator differential protection. Normally, the percentage bias setting of 5-10% is
adequate for longitudinal differential protection of the generator stator winding
whereas a setting of 20-40% may be required in case of power transformers.
•The longitudinal differential scheme caters for phase as well as ground faults
on the stator winding. However, it is unable to detect the inter-turn faults between
the turns of the same phase. This is discussed in the following Section.
Transverse Differential Protection
Transverse Differential Protection
•In order to apply this type of protection, a special type of split winding is
required as shown in Figure 8.6. Current in each parallel section is now compared
with that in the other section. If there is an inter-turn fault in one section then the
currents will differ and flow as spill current through the OC relay, as shown in
Figure 8.6.
Transverse Differential Protection
•In Figure 8.6, only the winding with the inter-turn fault is shown in detail.
The half of the winding in which there is an inter-turn fault is shown to carry 3000
A whereas the healthy half carries 3500 A.
•As seen from the figure, the current entering the phase c winding, as a
whole, is 6500 A which is the same as that leaving it. Therefore, a longitudinal
differential relay would be incapable of detecting such faults. However, because of
the splitting of the winding and transverse connection of the CTs, there is a spill
current of 0.72 A in the transverse differential relay Thus, a setting of, say, 0.5 A
will be enough to detect such an inter-turn fault.
Limitation of Differential Protection
Limitation of Differential Protection
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Differential Protection
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Problems
Transverse Differential Protection
•In order to apply this type of protection, a special type of split winding is
required as shown in Figure 8.6. Current in each parallel section is now compared
with that in the other section. If there is an inter-turn fault in one section then the
currents will differ and flow as spill current through the OC relay, as shown in
Figure 8.6.
Transverse Differential Protection
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Transverse Differential Protection
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Transverse Differential Protection
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Transverse Differential Protection
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Rotor Faults
Rotor Faults
•The rotor carries the field winding which is kept isolated from the ground.
Neither the positive nor the negative terminal of the dc supply is grounded. Thus,
any ground fault on the rotor field winding does not affect the working of the
alternator. However, a subsequent fault would cause a section of the rotor winding
to be short circuited, giving rise to a secondary flux which opposes the main flux
in the proximity of the shorted turns, causing distortion in the distribution of main
flux. The flux will get concentrated on one pole but dispersed over the other and
intervening surfaces. The resulting asymmetry in the electromagnetic forces will
cause severe vibrations of the rotor.
•In a modern turbo-alternator, the inertia of rotation is very large and the
rotor-to-stator clearances are very small, therefore, there is a likelihood of
permanent damage to the turbo-alternator.
Rotor Faults
•Instances have been reported where, during rotor faults, because of severe
mechanical stresses structural damage was caused.
•In the light of the above, the very first fault on the field winding must be
detected and the set tripped in a controlled manner.
Rotor Faults
•An arrangement for rotor earth fault detection and protection is shown in
Figure 8.7, wherein an external voltage source is superimposed on the rotor
circuit. This external voltage source is grounded so that the very first rotor earth
fault causes a dc fault current to flow which is easily detected by an OC relay.