P3-26

CONTROLLED SWITCHING OF CIRCUIT BREAKER AND ITS SITE

MEASUREMENT IN POWER DISTRIBUTION SYSTEM

Liuling Li, Y. QIU

Xian Jiaotong University, Xian, 7 10049,China

ABSTRACT equipping closing resistors to CB. But closing resistor is

so complex that CB plus closing resistors becomes
The composition of phase-controlled high voltage bigger in size, higher i n price, and lower in stability and
circuit breaker. special requirement about circuit reliability. Normally. CB with closing resistors is used
breaker. and setting of phase-controlled unit are in high voltage ( 2 245 K V ) networks. The frequent
introduced in this paper. To apply this kind of circuit discharges of surge arrestor will seriously shorten its
breaker to shunt reactor circuit, we also measured the lifetime. Since middle of 1970s, phase-controlled
switching over-voltage resulting from breaker's switching technique of CB has been developed in some
breaking operation. foreign countries. The main design principle is to
Keywords: Phase-controlled, Phase-controlled unit, minimize the amplitude of over-voltage by closing or
I-Iigh voltage circuit breaker. tripping the CB at a certain phase angle. So the
traditional closing resistors and series reactors can be
INTRODUCTION replaced by phase-controlled switching unit. Statistical
data of ClGRE show: By 1993, only 2 units of phase-
The operation of high voltage circuit breaker in the controlled switching CBs were used for breaking the
network will result in over-voltage. The amplitude of transmission line, the rest of them were used for closing
over-voltage is strongly related with the parameters of the capacitor bank and transformer other than breaking
electrical network, specially the performance of circuit shunt reactors. The main reason of phase control
breakers. e.g. making or breaking phase-angle of CB. switching unit not being widely used is because people
For example, when making long no-load transmission doubt its element and function stability. Along with the
I ine. shunt capacitor bank or breaking shunt reactor, no- development of electronic technique nowadays. the
load transformer. these CB operations most probably phase control switching tec hn iq tie is beco in i ng more
\\,ill result in high amplitude over-voltages, and these and more important. From Table I . we can find most of'
over-voltages are often dangerous to the insulation of the phase control units were put into service after mid
apparatus in electrical network. 1980s.
..
I he traditional measurements to suppress the over-
voltage are using series reactors, surge arrestors, or

Country own 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 I993 Sub-total
I Austria 15 1 13 10 39
Belgium 2 4 6 I

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Even though there were studies on this phase-controlled means CB’s mechanical performance must be very
switching technique in China long time ago, but there stable: closing or opening time for every 2 operations
was no application in the electric network until 1997. In should be equal or less than 0.5 ms, even coils are under
1998. the first unit of phase-controlled switching device different operation voltages.
was used in 500 KV transmission line instead of closing For CB used to break the sinall inductive current, in
resistors. In 2000, 2 units of phase-controlled switching order to get optimum break performance ( i.e. the
devices were in service for breaking reactors. By the minimum switching over-voltage), this CB should be
end of 2001, there will be 5 units for breaking reactors, specially staggered: phase A opened first, phase B and
and 2 units for capacitor banks in service, all of them C staggered 90 degree and opened simultaneously. For
being used together with SF6 breakers for 35 KV 50 Hz system, phase B and C delay 5 ins. Figure 2
distribution network. These phase-controlled switching shows opening diagram of ABB LTB 72.5DI/BUS
CBs used in distribution system are all from ABB breaker. We can see phase B and C delayed 5 ms than
company. Fig. 1 shows the phase-controlled switching phase A.

i: ....-A #--A..” .... . . ....

1. -1 ......
I. .....i...8 .+ . . ,..., ,
.+

Fig.2 Opening diagram of LTB72.5DIIBUS CB

Fig. I Phase-controlled switching units installed in
control cubicle panel THE DESIGN PRINCIPLE OF PHASE-
CONTROLLED SWITCHJNG UNIT
THE REQUIREMENT FOR PHASE-
CONTROLLED SWITCHING CB Phase-controlled switching unit is a computer-based
control unit. For example. ABB’s Switchsync E l 13
There are different requirements for circuit breakers (Hereafter denoted as E l 13) consists of microcomputer.
used in different circuits. For example, in long no-load reference voltage input, reference current input.
transmission line and shunt capacitors circuit, more operation command input. output, alarm output, input
serious condition is CB’s closing operation compared buttons and display panel. It should be specially
with its opening operation. The purpose for phase- mentioned that its internal EEPROM retains entered
controlled switching is to try to minimize the voltage data even at power supply failure, so the El I3 can
jump in the circuit, i.e., to minimize the pre-break down function correctly with no danger of mal-operation.
voltage across the breaker chamber. For no-load Figure 3 shows the function principle of E l 13. For
transformer and shunt reactors circuit, because opening closing operation, when control unit gets a command
operation will most probably result in higher amplitude ‘ l ’ , computer processor of control unit resets its clock
over-voltage, so we try to break the circuit at current zero at next voltage zero point. This reference voltage
zero point and avoid chop current. signal is obtained from source side voltage transformer
Phase-controlled switching CB consists of phase- ‘ 2 ’ . After certain time TVTOT.
control unit E l 13 outputs
controlled switching unit and circuit breaker. To acquire
correct close/trip phase angle, the scatter of circuit a ‘close’ command ‘3’ to CB. The time delay TVTOT
is
breaker’s close/trip time needs to be very small. That

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determined by the processor based on entered data and A breaker always has a certain scatter of the operation
i n Adaptive Mode the results of earlier closing. time and dielectric strength. Statistically, the best phase
When E l 13 is used in Adaptive Mode, it notes the position for closing is little bit later than theoretical one.
phase position for switching carried out and adjusts its Because an early phase position gives a bigger prestrike
waiting time TVTOT for the next switching, taking into than a late phase position. E l 13 takes this into account
account any deviation from the desired phase position. with the factor TDz .
Such deviation can, for example, be caused by variation Since closing usually takes place by pre-arcing. the time
in the operation time. Adaptive mode is most required at from issued command until the circuit closes is
closing, at which current onset in current transformer normally longer than the operation time measured fi-om
'4' is usually used to detect that switching has been when command is issued until galvanic closing occurs.
carried out. E l 13 takes this into account with factor TD;. (see Fig.
3)
Closing the Shunt Capacitor Bank
Breaking of Shunt Reactors
Because the time zero of processor is the reference
voltage zero point, but the reference voltage is not Ideal breaking for shunt reactor is non-reignition
al"'ays the "Itage Of the CB phase to be first closed. breaking. That means to make the arcing as long as
Usually, the best phase position for switching has a possible, and break circuitat current zero,
distinct to the phase position Of the CB was connected into circuit like shown in figure 4,
"Itage in the Same phase' The phase difference To set the parameter of phase control switching unit.
between the latter and the reference "Itage used because reference voltage is from phase A. and first
depends On from which phase, Or between which phase opening phase is phase A too, so we input the parameter
the reference voltage is taken. The time difference
between the reference voltage and the best like following: T D I = S . O ~ S ,T D ~ =3.7IllS TD;
=O.Oms .
switching moment is called time delay TDI. In Fig.3,
closing capacitor bank, for phase R, TDI=O , (reference
voltage is taken from phase R ); for phase S , T ~ i = 6 . 7
ins; for phase T, T ~ 1 = 3 . 3ms. ( for 50 Hz network).

Fig3 Function principle of El 13"'

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 Voltage and current of phase A and C were recorded by
oscilloscope on site test. Each phase-controlled
switching CB was tested 3 times. One typical
oscillogram is shown in Figure 5. From the oscillogram.
we can found that the phase A and C almost ideally
. . break the current on Current zero point( See arrow
!
..- point). Each test is of almost the same results. .The
.- .
maximum over-voltage is about 1.09 P.u..

CONCLUSIONS

1 ) . The use of phase-controlled switching CB can

effectively suppress the switching over-voltage.
2). When using specially designed circuit breaker. and
combining with a phase-controlled switching unit. the
switching over-voltage caused by breaking shunt reactor
can be dramatically suppressed compared with by using
normal circuit breaker. The site test shows the over-
voltage can be suppressed lower than 1 . 1 p . ~ . .

REFERENCES
Uref : ( Phase A to earth) Reference voltage: 1: line
current : ug : Recovery voltage : Ubd : Dielectric strength of 1 . ClGRE Report, ELEKTRA No. I63
llic arc-quenching chamber : T a m i n : Shortest Arcing Time which
2 . ' SWITCHSYNC E 113 for synchronous switching
hcs not cause reignition at recovery voltage corresponding to I
of circuit breaker', ABB Product information. 5409
722-96E rev. 1
11 ti : 2 T ~ : 2Total window for contact separation .
Fig.4 The breaking principle to break a star
connection shunt reactor[*]

SITE TEST RESULTS

Fig. 5 Oscillogram of phase-controlled switching CB breaking a shunt reactor

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