Loss of Mains Protection

Loss-Of-Mains – LOM

 Loss of Mains (or islanding) occurs when part of the public

utility network (incorporating generation) loses connection
with the rest of the system OPEN
Utility network

Interconnected Psys
 If LOM is not detected, then system
Qsys
the generator could remain Pload
connected, causing a safety Qload
hazard within the network.

G
Pgen
Qgen
Generator
network
Loss-Of-Mains – LOM

 Risks of operating in islanded mode

OPEN
 System can become unearthed
Utility network

 Unsynchronised reclose Interconnected Psys

system
can occur Qsys
Pload
Qload
 System can be live when
utility personnel believe it is
not energised

 Faults in islanded mode G

may remain undetected
Pgen
  Islanding is not permitted Qgen
Generator
in most countries. network
 LOM performance requirements - sensitivity

 LOM should be sensitive under all possible load and

generation scenarios.

 The most challenging scenario is when the local load closely

follows the generator output both in terms of active and
reactive power.

P [MW] load profile

Interconnected 30
generation
system
profile
feeder Pload 20
Qload
~ } non-detection zone
10

LOM

t1 t2 t3 t4 24

G Time [h]

Pgen Risk of undetected island

Qgen
LOM performance requirements - stability

 LOM should be stable under remote faults cleared by the

utility system.

 It is undesirable to issue a false trip as it leads to the

unnecessary disconnection of the generator.
Interconnected
system

feeder Pload
Qload
~

LOM

G
Pgen
Qgen
 Generator performance during islanding

 Simplified rotor swing

equation in SI units:
5

dr
H=2s
H=4s

 Tm  Te
deviation from synchronous speed [rad/s]

4
J
3
dt
2
where:
J – inertia constant [kg m2]
r – rotor speed [rad/s]
1

 Tm – mechanical torque [N m]
0
0 0.5 1 t 1.5 2 2.5 Te – electromagnetic torque [N m]
-1
time [s]

1
Jr20
kinetic energy at synchronous speed 2 H – inertia constant [s]
H 
machine nominal power Sn
Generator performance during islanding
f
 Taking into account that r  2  f r and fr  initial rate of change
p
of frequency during islanding can be calculated as follows:

1
dr Jr20
 T 2  H  Sn
(1) J (2) H2  J
dt Sn r20
2  H  S n dr 2  H  S n df r 2  H  S n 2 df
 2   T
(3)
r 0
2
dt r 0
2
dt 2 f  p dt
r0
p

2  H  S n df 2  H  S n df
(4)  Tr 0   P
f dt f dt
df P  f

dt 2  S n  H
Generator performance during islanding
Exiter Islanded
Exiter system

 Governor also has an CB opens at t=1s

impact on the dynamic
performance during the
G
islanding event however in
the first 100-200ms the
impact can be neglected.
LOAD
Exiter
Governor

2 5
Generator with Governor H=2s
Generator without Governor H=4s
deviation from synchronous speed [rad/s]

deviation from synchronous speed [rad/s] 4

1.5

3
1

0.5
1

0
0
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

-0.5 -1
time [s] time [s]
LOM detection methods

 Rate-Of-Change-Of-Frequency (ROCOF)

 Voltage Vector Shift (VS)

 Reverse VAR method

 Direct Intertrip

 Rate of Change of Power

 Active methods
Rate-Of-Change-Of-Frequency (ROCOF) Method
 The ROCOF method is based on the local measurement of the
generator voltage and estimation of the rate of change of frequency.

 The measured rate of change of frequency is compared with a preset

threshold.

 Additional time delay can also be applied.

 The rate of change of frequency following an LOM event is directly

proportional to the amount of active power imbalance between local
load and the generator output.
P  f
ROCOF 
2  Sn  H
ROCOF – estimated rate of change of frequency [Hz/s]
ΔP – change in active output power during LOM event [MW]
Sn – nominal generator rating [MVA]
f – generator rated frequency [Hz]
H – inertia constant of the generator [s]
ROCOF sensitivity
Assume typical ROCOF setting of 0.125Hz/s

Interconnected
Power System
Loss of grid connection
~

Correct ROCOF 50.1

Operation
50.05

50

trip
frequency [Hz]

49.95
Load
49.9
DG
ROCOF
49.85
f
Relay
49.8

f t
ROCOF  49.75

t 49.7
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
time [s]
ROCOF stability
Assume typical ROCOF setting of 0.125Hz/s

Interconnected
Power System
System fault
~
Fault clearance
False ROCOF
50.1
Operation
50.05

50
trip
frequency [Hz]

Load 49.95

DG 49.9
ROCOF
Relay 49.85 f
49.8

f
ROCOF  49.75
t
t 49.7
0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5 3
time [s]
ROCOF – summary

 ROCOF method is based on the local

measurement of the system frequency at the
generator terminals.

 ROCOF does not require communication

 It generally provides a good sensitivity to genuine

islanding events but has a small non-detection
zone

 ROCOF can suffer form unwanted (spurious)

operations during remote system faults.
Example
30MVA Distributed Generator with rotor inertia of J = 1285 kg m2 is
protected by the ROCOF LOM protection set to 0.4Hz/s. Due to
spurious tripping of the feeder protection the generator became
islanded. Will the ROCOF relay operate if the local load prior to
islanding was Pload = 20MW and the generator output was Pgen= 22MW?
Assume the generator has one pole pair.
Interconnected
system
Pload
feeder Qload

LOM

G
Pgen
Solution
Qgen
Voltage Vector Shift (VS) LOM Method
 The relay measures voltage phase changes in consecutive
cycles (or half cycles) and compares the value with the preset
threshold.

 Zero crossing technique is often used as method of angle

measurement

 VS is very fast in comparison to other methods such as

ROCOF

 VS is sensitive to network faults (both resulting in islanding

situation and remote faults cleared by the utility)

 VS is not sensitive to rate of change of frequency

(recommended setting of 6-10 requires imbalance of more
than 30%Sn to cause operation)
Typical fault current of a synchronous
generator Subtransient
Transient period Steady-state period
period Xd’ Xd
Xd”
 Voltage Vector Shift (VS) LOM Method

 Generator terminal voltage angle changes by  due to

step change in load current and the generator reactance.
Xd Xd
Xd’ Xd’
Xd” Xd”

R IL2 R
IL1

Ed2 VT2
Ed1 Ed1’ Ed1” VT1 Ed2’ Ed2”

Connected Islanded

"
” d1
d”

d1 = E
E
IL1 X

"
E d2

”
Xd
IL2
VT1
j2  IL2
j1 VT2 R
IL1 R
IL1 IL2
 Voltage Vector Shift (VS) LOM Method

 Generator terminal voltage angle changes by  due to

step change in load current and the generator reactance.
Subtransient Subtransient
Xd Xd
generator model generator model
Xd’ Transition resulting Xd’
Xd” from step change in Xd”

R power output IL2 R

IL1

Ed2 VT2
Ed1 Ed1’ Ed1” VT1 Ed2’ Ed2”

Connected Islanded

"
” d1
d”

d1 = E
E
IL1 X

"
E d2

”
Xd
IL2
VT1
j2  IL2
j1 VT2 R
IL1 R
IL1 IL2
Example
Vector Shift is used to protect an Embedded Generator. Calculate the
voltage angle change if the generator output increased from 15MW to
25MW as a result of an LOM event. Before islanding the generator
operated at unity power factor pf1=1 and after loss of grid connection
power factor changed to pf2=0.85 (lagging load). Assume that at the
time of islanding the generator terminal voltage was VT1 = 1/0°pu.
Generator: Sn = 30 MVA Vn = 33 kV
Xd” = 0.23 pu Ra = 0.05 pu

Xd
Xd’
X d”
IL R

Ed E d’ E d” VT
Solution
Reverse VAR LOM Method
 Reverse VAR relay measures the generator reactive power
flow Qgen and operates when it exceeds a fixed threshold.

Trip if Qgen > Qs

Interconnected Psys Interconnected Psys=0

system system
Qsys Pload Qsys=0 Pload
Qload Qload

LOM LOM

G G
Pgen Pgen
Qgen»0
Connected Qgen Islanded
Reverse VAR LOM Method

 The amount of reactive power from the generator Qgen may become
insufficient to activate the relay if the total capacitance of the
connecting cables is high delivering reactive power to the loads.

Interconnected Psys=0
system

Islanded Qsys=0 Pload

Qload

LOM Qc

G Qc

Pgen Qc

Qgen
Reverse VAR LOM Method

 In case of an island with multiple generators the amount of

reactive power exported by the generator depends on the
type of voltage controller (AVR).

 It is possible that some of the machines in a

multigenerator island will not export sufficient amount of
reactive power to activate the relay.

 Reverse VAR method is therefore not widely used.

Direct Intertripping
 Intertripping scheme detects the opening of contacts at the
point of disconnection and transmits the signal to all the
generators that could potentially support the island.

 Intertripping scheme does not depend on any measurements.

 The operation is almost instantaneous.

Intertrip

G
Direct Intertripping
 Intertripping must be transmitted from every point of
disconnection where the viable island could be formed.
 Cost of intertripping is comparatively high (£15k-£100k).
 Communication media has to be reliable. Commonly used
techniques include: leased land line, radio (10km), microwave
(20km), PLC (100km), fibre optic cable (20-50km), copper
cable (10km).

Intertrip

G
Direct Intertripping
 Intertripping must be transmitted from every point of
disconnection where the viable island could be formed.
 Cost of intertripping is comparatively high (£15k-£100k).
 Communication media has to be reliable. Commonly used
techniques include: leased land line, radio (10km), microwave
(20km), PLC (100km), fibre optic cable (20-50km), copper
cable (10km).

Intertrip

G
Direct Intertripping
 Intertripping must be transmitted from every point of
disconnection where the viable island could be formed.
 Cost of intertripping is comparatively high (£15k-£100k).
 Communication media has to be reliable. Commonly used
techniques include: leased land line, radio (10km), microwave
(20km), PLC (100km), fibre optic cable (20-50km), copper
cable (10km).

Intertrip

G
Intertripping of Open Ring Feeders

 Intertripping for open ring feeders can be facilitated using

Power Line Carrier (PLC) technique.
 Intertripping signal is always delivered to the correct
generators regardless of the position of the open point.

Signal send

Signal block
G G
Signal receive Open point
Signal receive
Signal block

Signal send

G
Signal receive
Intertripping of Open Ring Feeders

 Intertripping for open ring feeders can be facilitated using

Power Line Carrier (PLC) technique.
 Intertripping signal is always delivered to the correct
generators regardless of the position of the open point.

Signal send

Signal block
G G
Signal receive Open point Signal receive

Signal block

Signal send

G
Signal receive
 Satellite based LOM protection
Transmission
 The LOM protection algorithm System
uses the difference between
the received signal and the ~
locally measured frequency to
estimate the voltage angle trip

shift according to the following

formula:
DG GPS stamped
LOM frequency signal
 n   n 1  2 ( f n  f nref )t Protection

n – calculated angle
fn – frequency measured locally
fnref – reference frequency received from the satellite
t – angle calculation time step

 A tripping signal is sent when n exceeds the preset threshold.

Satellite based LOM protection
 The algorithm uses voltage angle rather than rate of change
of frequency as a decisive quantity.

 Satellite channel latency is compensated in software

ffnnrefest
f

fn-30 fn-25
fn

t time
 The method is less sensitive to system faults while preserving
good sensitivity to genuine LOM events