2017 2nd International Conference for Convergence in Technology (I2CT)

Advanced Technique in Micro Grid Protection for

Various Fault by Using Numerical Relay
Pooja Khandare1,*, Prof.S.A.Deokar1, Prof.A.M.Dixit2
1
Department of Technology,Savitribai phule Pune University
[email protected]
1
Campus Director,ZES’sDCOER,Pune

Abstract-Microgrid is a part of Power System where energy is

generated from renewable source and supplied to cus-tomer A.Discussion on various fault occur in Microgrid
directly or indirectly. As traditional sources are going to There are many types of fault occur on microgrid
vanish day by day demand of renewable sources goes on each fault has its own characteristic and conditions which
increasing. Trading renewable energy route can make India may help for differentiation in each fault. Following are
on the pathway to energy independent, low carbon emission, types of fault occur in microgrid
and build foundation for new generation with sustainable
1) Symmetrical Fault - These faults involves all three
future. More research and implementation of microgrid will
be conducted to improve micro grid tech-nology. Among phases. Examples of this type are
different aspects, most challenging task with renewable is x LLL fault
protection. Because We cannot predict behavior of nature as x LLLG fault
it is uncontrollable for human kind. India is having plenty of 2) Unsymmetrical Faults –These faults involves one or
renewable available as natural re-sources but challenge is to two phases. Examples are-
use it in optimized way. Hence protection of micro grid is key
issues. This paper discuss technical challenges in protection
x LG fault
of microgrid and sug-gested some solutions which help power x LL fault
system to use non-traditional sources in efficient way. x LLG fault
Keywords: Fault analysis, Microgrid, Protection. 3) High Impedance Fault(HIFs) are defined as unrequired
material such as part of conducting material and foreign
I. INTRODUCTION
object e.g tree come in contact with each other . These
“Microgrid is defined as way of integrating large number insulators have high resistance to current flow so relays
of renewable energy sources like solar,disel,wind,hydro, and circuit breaker will not detect HIF very easily .
with distribution system. One problem with successful mi- This condition raises situation like death by electrocu-
crogrid implementation is designing proper protection tion, severe electrical burns, or fires ignited by arcing
scheme”. Investigator says. Relay protection of microgrid is and heating of materials.
different than conventional power distribution grid in follow-
ing ways (1) Current flow in microgrid in both directions B . Causes of Fault
while in conventional grid support Factors that may cause fault to occur are:
single end power supply. (2)Use of large power electronic
converters causes another problem. (3)Relay protection i. Bad weather such as lightning strikes, falling of
should be provided for islanding and normal mode, with high snow, raining with strong winds, salt pollution on
speed, selectivity and reliability which lead to great chal- insulators on overhead lines and in substations,
lenge for protection of Microgrid[1].This issue must be fo- causes short circuit fault.
cused by researcher because solution on this problem will ii. Tree for example when the branch of the tree falls
lead to optimized operation of microgrid.This study present out and touches the line may cause fault to occur. It
microgrid protection scheme based on designing of numeri- depends on how much the branch touch the line to
cal relay and successful results for mitigation of High imped- determine the type of fault.
ance fault and LLG fault is obtained in MATLAB environ-
ment. The proposed scheme have ability to identify type of iii. Animal like monkey may cause short circuit when
fault and accordingly relay will generate signal to trip circuit it touches between 1 or more line. To determine the
breaker and microgrid is protected. Amplitude and harmonic type of fault that occur it depends on the number of
comparison in fault also detect external or internal fault. line that it touched. Common cases are line to
Same scheme can be applied for all types of fault with many ground fault.
buses in grid connected and off grid mode. iv. Human error contributed from vandalism, accident,
failure of joint on cables or overhead lines and fails
to ensure circuit breaker to operate.

978-1-5090-4307-1/17/$31.00 ©2017 IEEE 803

 II FAULT ANALYSIS IN MICROGRID applied to a transmission line, the CTs are physically sepa-
A. Proposed Protection scheme for Microgrid rated, and it is not practical to connect the CT secondary to
the same relay. In such implementations, the pilot commu-
In most of power distribution system flow of power is unidi-
rectional from distribution station to client which does not nications becomes an integral part of the protective relay.
cause any complication. And protection system is designed But in case of Distribution Transmission lines, as line length
using over current protection with simplicity and low cost is are short same differential relay can be used. IEEE C37.11
there. [4][5]hence once DG sources or microgrid is included (IEEE guide for the application of current transformers used
in normal distribution system flow of power is not radial in for protective relaying purposes)[14]
nature it will be bi directional and hence existing protection
system is not responded smoothly [6].This change in re-
sponse is due to change in fault current level and different
directions of fault current.To protect power electronic de-
vices during fault is very crucial task .Hence aim is to iden-
tify and address protection issue in microgrid when con-
nected in grid mode as well as islanded mode. Protection
scheme with Use of modern communication technique and
protocol , individual relay can communicate and exchange
information with central computer or betwen individual
relay is designed. [1]
Following is objective of designed system Fig 1: Basic Operating principle of Differential Relaying

i. Detection of faulty line in microgrid

C.Relay arrangement for bus protection
ii. To isolate faulted line from Microgrid
iii. Protect power electronic devices used in microgrid Length of Microgrid is very small and connected
to sensitive device like inverters so in case fault occur on
iv. To protect the consumer’s apparatus transmission line speed of operating relay matter most in
v. To protect the system from unnecessary service inter- this condition to avoid damage. However, in this case fig
ruptions and disturbances [2], the relay will issue a trip command to all the circuit
breakers connected to the bus during a bus fault. And then
vi. Vi) To disconnect faulted lines, transformers, or
circuit breaker trip. Faulted line is eliminated if relay is
other apparatus. designed with numerical techniques communication is done
vii. Vii)To detect fault is internal or External among all relays and signal will send to main monitoring
device.
viii. Viii)To design Protection scheme of microgrid in
Grid connected as well as Non grid mode.

In grid connected mode fault current is large as due

to combination of main grid with microgrid. Similarly In
islanded mode current level is very small so traditional
protection system can not detect fault current and power
electronic devices are victims for this changes Therefore,
there is a need to designed the protection scheme capable Fig 2: Differential Bus Protection

of responding appropriately to different types of faults with-

D.Design of Numerical Relay for Microgrid
in islanded microgrid.[8]
This section gives detailed protection strategy for
B. Digital Differential Protection medium voltage Microgrid.If fault occur in Microgrid ,this
Designing of numerical relay for micro grid is bas- relay generate signal for circuit breaker as well as commu-
ically based on principle of difference in two current flow- nicate with other element in Microgrid hence it is called as
ing through primary and secondary winding of CTs. fig[1] “Communication Assisted Differential relay”. This relay is
shows Element which is to protected that may be length of designed with help of MATLAB SIMULINK environment
conductor, Winding of motor, or bus section is kept between due to user friendly software and help in protection against
two CTs. However, when current differential relaying is each internal fault. This paper proposed system for High

804
impedance fault and LLG fault which work successfully for is out of range then load switching is occurred. Outputs of
internal fault as well as load switching operation. Algorithm amplitude comparator block and harmonic calculation block
for operation of numerical relay is based on harmonic- is then fed to AND gate for final output.
current restraint and amplitude comparison .fault current
content various harmonic component if amplitude of har-
monics in between 30% to 60% as compared with funda-
mental harmonic fault is internal. The other harmonics are
progressively less. Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) is used to
implement this approach.

Fig 3: Basic Operating principle of Differential Relaying

Where is DC component of f(t)
Different faults are simulated on sample distribu-
and are cosine and sine coefficient of
tion system and relay is deployed on this system. This algo-
frequency f(t)
rithm fig [4] is used to test all types of faults, LG fault, LL
fault, LLG and LLL and High impedance fault. Relay gene-
rates trip signal on initiation of fault and send it to circuit
breaker for operation.

Fourier coefficient is expressed in

Where is is the nth harmonic coefficient for n =

1, 2,...,N
And x(k) is the signal f(t) in its discrete
form.
FFT is faster than DFT as far as speed is con-
cerned. flow chart of the designed digital Fourier Transform
based logic technique algorithm is shown in fig[3]

E.Working of Numerical Relay in Matlab

Microgrid numerical relay operate in matlab in two
way “amplitude comparator Module “and “harmonic com- Fig 4: Flow chart for operation of Numerical Relay

parator module”. Following fig[3] is modeled in Matlab III SIMULATION OF HIGH IMPEDANCE FAULT
Simulink .two values from current transformer as input sig-
When fault current is below pick up of conventional over
nal are given to rms block and output of which is used to
current, If<100 Amps on grounded system, which occurs
calculate absolute value of difference in two output signals. because of Incipient insulator failures, Fallen conductors on
This value is send to relational operator for comparison and concrete, tree, soil, gravel, sand, asphalt, etc. which lead to
accordingly output signal is generated .if difference between firing of some material around us because of high potential.
two signal is equal to 0 fault is external and if value is less This situation leads utility to lost power delivered to load.In
than 1 fault is internal.at same time harmonic comparator traditional protection scheme some significant amount of
work on other side . two input signals are fed to FFT block energy directly enter into ground with different relay moni-
and binary output signal is generated from ratio block which toring system and never reaches its load. In this study a
operates on harmonics of these two signals. If value of har- inventory technique is proposed which model, locate, and
detect high-impedance faults. Different Patterns and charac-
monic is between (10 % to 30%) of fundamental harmonics
teristics in the line’s current used for recognition of such
HIF exist or some external fault occur on system.but if value
faults.[13]

805
 Emanuel model technique proposed in[10]is used to challenge of system is False tripping of circuit breaker.If
create Matlab Model which contain two DC sources, Vp and load increase on sysetm then complete shutdown of micro-
Vn. where Vn. and Vp represent the arcing voltage of air in grid will occur to protect system is challenging work.
soil and/or between trees and the distribution line; two resis-
tances, Rp and Rn, between diodes which represent the resis- IV RESULT AND CONCLUSION
tance of trees and/or the earth resistance. if line voltage is Fig-[7]shows clearance of double line to ground fault oc-
more than Vp fault current starts flowing towards cur on sample distribution system and fig-[8]shows clear-
ground.and when line voltage is less than Vn. fault current ance of HIF fault on sample distribution system and cleared
reverse back from ground . by using numerical relay. Microgrids can be protected using
digital current differential relay deployed at each line end in
system. Relay structure thus proposed is able to protect all
types of fault in medium voltage microgrid. In this way
complete protection of microgrid system can be achieved.
Future scope is, in this paper Numerical differential relay
Protection is designed for sample distribution system. This
system needs to apply to any bus distribution system with
Fig 5: Emanuel Model of HIF relay coordination within buses. Also back up protection
should also deploy to have complete protection of system if
Using parameters of a variable resistance is modeled in primary protection fails by any means.
matlab with controlled voltage source.Hence To study a
simulation of HIF, a sample distribution system is consi-
dered with 12.47kV three phase source and transmission
line with two circuit breakers on both sides fig[6]. High
impedance fault and LLG fault created on sample distribu-
tion system in matlab Model . and With help of numerical
relay both fault is detected and also pass information to
neighboring element .By further extension in research ,with
standard communication system relay can communicate
with central protection unit which govern overall protection
of microgrid.
Fig 7: Clearance of double line to ground fault with numerical relay

Fig 8:Clearance of HIF with numerical relay

Fig 6: Matlab model for HIF fault with Numerical Relay

A.Challenge of protection in real time system REFERENCES

[1] “Microgrid Protection using communication –Assisted digital

There is group of 210 households from 7 different tribal relays” Eric Sortomme, Student Member, IEEE, S. S. Venkata, Life
hamlets located in Zaap, Aine & Pathardi Gram Panchayats Fellow, IEEE, and Joydeep Mitra, Senior Member, IEEE, IEEE
of Jawhar taluka district thane , Maharashtra.Name of tribal TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 25, NO. 4,
are Bhatipada, Hedolipada, Dakhanepada, Navapada, Man- OCTOBER 2010
[2] “A New Approach to Current Differential Protection for Trans-
mohadipada, Umbarpada & Wadpada.generation of power is mission Lines”, M. G. Adamiak, W. Premerlani, ELECTRIC
38KWP with solar microgrid. As government electricity is COUNCIL OF NEW ENGLAND Protective Relaying Committee
not yet reached to this villages , Pragati Pratishthan and Meeting October 22-23, 1998
completely funded by ICICI Bank developed INR 1.39 [3] “Protection of Microgrids Using Differential Relays”, Manjula
Dewadasa, Member, IEEE, Arindam Ghosh, Fellow, IEEE and Ge-
Crore project. TV sets, fans, refrigerator are already in oper- rard Ledwich, Senior Member, IEEE
ation, apart from basic home and street lighting in each
hamlet Pump & Floor Mill is expected in near future.Main

806
[4] “Protection and control of active distribution networks and mi-
crogrids”, Mohammad Amin Zamani, The University of Western
Ontario London, Ontario, Canada
[5] “High Impedance Fault Detection on Distribution Systems”, by C.
G. Wester, General Electric Company, 2008 [Online]. Availa-
ble:http://pm.geindustrial.com/faq/documents/f60/ger-3993.pdf.
[6] "Fault Analysis and Protection of a Microgrid" E. Sortomme,
Student Member, IEEE, G. J. Mapes, B. A. Foster, S. S. Venkata, Fel-
low, IEEE Smart grid in 2010market segments application industry
player David j Leeds GTM research july 2009
[7] High Impedance Fault Detection on Distribution Systems, C. G.
Wester,General Electric Company, 2008 [Online]. vai-
lale:http://pm.geindustrial.com/faq/documents/f60/ger3993.pdf
[8] "Adaptive protection system for distribution networks with dis-
tributed energy resources"N. Schaefer, et al., , in Developments in
Power System Protection (DPSP 2010). Managing the Change, 10th
IET International Conference on, 2010, pp. 1-5
[9] “High Impedance Fault Detection of Distribution Network by
Phasor Measurement Units”,MohsenGhaleiMonfaredZanjani, Hos-
seinKazemiKaregar, Hasan AshrafiNiaki, Mina GhaleiMonfaredZan-
jani,Smart Grid and Renewable Energy, 2013,4,297-305
http://dx.doi.org/10.4236/sgre.2013.43036 Published Online June
2013
[10] “High impedance fault detection in low voltage netwoks”,R. C.
Christie, H. Zadehgol and M. M. Habib, IEEE Trans. on Power Deli-
very, vol. 8, no. 4, pp. 1829-1836, Oct. 1993.
[11] “Distribution high impedance fault detection utilizing high fre-
quency current components”B. M. Aucoin and B. D. Russell, ,
IEEE Trans. on Power Apparatus and Systems, vol. 101, no. 6, pp.
1596-1606, Jun. 1982.
[12] “Unique aspects of distribution system harmonics due to high
impedance ground faults”,D. I. Jeerings and J. R. Linders, IEEE
Trans. on Power Delivery, vol. 5, no. 2, pp. 1086-1094, Apr. 1990.
[13] “High-Impedance Fault Detection Using Discrete Wavelet Transform
and Frequency Range and RMS Conversion”,T. M. Lai, L. A. Snider,
Senior Member, IEEE, E. Lo, Member, IEEE, and D. Sutanto, Senior
Member, IEEE
[14] “IEEE Guide for the Application of Current Transformers Used for
Protective Relaying Purposes,"IEEE Std C37.110-2007), pp. C1-
67,2008

807