Electrical Power & Machines Dept.

‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬

Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

Busbar Protection:

The protection scheme for a power system should cover the whole system against all probable
types of fault. Unrestricted forms of line protection, such as overcurrent and distance systems,
meet this requirement, although faults in the busbar zone are cleared only after some time
delay. But if unit protection is applied to feeders and plant, the busbars are not inherently
protected.
Busbars have often been left without specific protection, for one or more of the following
reasons:
 The busbars and switchgear have a high degree of reliability, to the point of being
regarded as intrinsically safe
 It was feared that accidental operation of busbar protection might cause widespread
dislocation of the power system, which, if not quickly cleared, would cause more loss
than would the very infrequent actual bus faults
 It was hoped that system protection or back-up protection would provide sufficient bus
protection if needed
It is true that the risk of a fault occurring on modern metalclad gear is very small, but it cannot
be entirely ignored.
However, the damage resulting from one uncleared fault, because of the concentration of fault
MVA, may be very extensive indeed, up to the complete loss of the station by fire.
Serious damage to or destruction of the installation would probably result in widespread and
prolonged supply interruption.
Finally, system protection will frequently not provide the cover required. Such
protection may be good enough for small distribution substations, but not for important
stations. Even if distance protection is applied to all feeders, the busbar will lie in the second
zone of all the distance protections, so a bus fault will be cleared relatively slowly, and the
resultant duration of the voltage dip imposed on the rest of the system may not be tolerable.
With outdoor switchgear the case is less clear since, although the likelihood of a fault is
higher, the risk of widespread damage resulting is much less. In general then, busbar
protection is required when the system protection does not cover the busbars, or when, in
67
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

order to maintain power system stability, high-speed fault clearance is necessary. Unit busbar
protection provides this, with the further advantage that if the busbars are sectionalized, one
section only need be isolated to clear a fault. The case for unit busbar protection is in fact
strongest when there is sectionalization.

Differential Protection Principles

The Merz-Price principle is applicable to a multi-terminal zone such as a busbar. The principle
is a direct application of Kirchhoff's first law. Usually, the circulating current arrangement is
used, in which the current transformers and interconnections form an analogue of the busbar
and circuit connections. A relay connected across the CT bus wires represents a fault path in
the primary system in the analogue and hence is not energized until a fault occurs on the
busbar; it then receives an input that, in principle at least, represents the fault current.
The scheme may consist of a single relay connected to the bus wires connecting all the current
transformers in parallel, one set per circuit, associated with a particular zone, as shown in
Figure 46(a). This will give earth fault protection for the busbar. This arrangement has often
been thought to be adequate.

Figure 46: Circulating current scheme

68
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

If the current transformers are connected as a balanced group for each phase together with a
three-element relay, as shown in Figure 46(b), additional protection for phase faults can be
obtained.

High Impedance Differential Protection:

High impedance protection system is a simple technique which requires that all CTs used in
the protection scheme have relatively high knee point voltage, similar magnetizing
characteristic and the same ratio. These CTs shall be installed in all ends of the protected
object. In order to make the scheme, all CTs belonging to one phase shall be connected in
parallel.
Typical high impedance differential scheme is shown in Figure 47. Note that only one phase is
shown in this figure. Due to the parallel CT connections the high impedance differential relay
can only measure the operating quantity. That means that there is no any stabilizing quantity
in such schemes. Therefore in order to guaranty the stability of the relay during external faults
the operating quantity must not exceed the set pickup value.

Figure 47: Typical high impedance differential scheme

For external faults, even with severe saturation of some of the current transformers, the
voltage across the CT paralleling point shall not rise above the relay pickup value. To achieve
that a suitable value for setting resistor Rs shall be selected in such a way that the saturated CT
provides a much lower impedance path as compared with the measuring branch. Thus, in case
of an external fault causing current transformer saturation, the non-saturated current
transformers will drive most of the spill differential current through the secondary winding of
69
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

the saturated current transformer and not through the measuring branch. The voltage drop
across the saturated current transformer secondary winding will appear also across the
measuring branch; however it will typically be relatively small. Therefore, the pick-up value
of the relay has to be set above this false operating voltage.
In case of an internal fault, the fault current tries to flow through the measuring branch. Due to
high ohmic value of setting resistor this will result in a steep voltage increase across the whole
scheme and fast saturation of all current transformers. The differential relay is designed to
operate under such conditions.
To ensure reliable operation with internal faults, the knee-point voltage of the current
transformers used in the scheme must be about two times the set pickup voltage.
Often the non-linear resistors are required in order to limit the over voltages during internal
fault to less than 2kV peak value, which is standard insulation level for used for secondary
equipment and wiring.
The differential protection sensitivity corresponds to the sum of magnetizing currents of all
parallel connected current transformers, current drawn by non-linear resistor and the relay
operating current for set pick-up voltage.

Low Impedance Differential Protection:

Low-impedance bus differential relays are so named because the differential relay current
inputs have a low impedance to the flow of CT secondary current. This means that the low-
impedance bus differential relays can share the CTs with other relays, meters, transducers, etc.
The low impedance bus differential scheme typically has one set of current inputs for each
phase from every set of CTs in the scheme.
Distributed busbar protection scheme, as shown in Figure 48, which uses Data Acquisition
Units (DAUs) installed in each bay to sample and pre-processes the signals and provides trip
rated output contacts. It uses a separate Central Unit (CU) for gathering and processing all the
information and fiber-optic communications between the CU and DAUs to deliver the data.
The main advantages of this scheme is reduced wiring, however the architecture of this
scheme is less reliable due to complexity in data transfer.

70
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

Figure 48: Distributed busbar protection

Capacitor Bank Protection:

- Time and Instantaneous Over Current & E/F Protection (Backup)

- Negative Sequence Directional Over Current & E/F Protection
- Thermal O/L Protection,
- Neutral Unbalance Current protection
- Compensated Neutral Displacement Voltage protection
- Over Voltage protection
- Under Voltage Protection
- CBF Protection (1 per group)
- Other Protections recommended by manufacturer

71
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

Capacitor Bank Design

The capacitor unit, Figure 49, is the building block of a shunt capacitor bank. The capacitor
unit is made up of individual capacitor elements, arranged in parallel/ series connected groups,
within a steel enclosure. The internal discharge device is a resistor that reduces the unit
residual voltage to 50V or less in 5 min. Capacitor units are available in a variety of voltage
ratings (240 V to 24940V) and sizes (2.5 kvar to about 1000 kvar).

Figure 49: The capacitor Unit

The protection of shunt capacitor banks requires understanding the basics of capacitor bank
design and capacitor unit connections. Shunt capacitors banks are arrangements of series/
paralleled connected units. Capacitor units connected in paralleled make up a group and series
connected groups form a single-phase capacitor bank.
As a general rule, the minimum number of units connected in parallel is such that isolation of
one capacitor unit in a group should not cause a voltage unbalance sufficient to place more
than 110% of rated voltage on the remaining capacitors of the group. Equally, the minimum
number of series connected groups is that in which the complete bypass of the group does not
subject the others remaining in service to a permanent overvoltage of more than 110%.

72
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

The maximum number of capacitor units that may be placed in parallel per group is governed
by a different consideration. When a capacitor bank unit fails, other capacitors in the same
parallel group contain some amount of charge. This charge will drain off as a high frequency
transient current that flows through the failed capacitor unit and its fuse. The fuse holder and
the failed capacitor unit should withstand this discharge transient.
The discharge transient from a large number of paralleled capacitors can be severe enough to
rupture the failed capacitor unit or the expulsion fuse holder, which may result in damage to
adjacent units or cause a major bus fault within the bank. To minimize the probability of
failure of the expulsion fuse holder, or rupture of the capacitor case, or both, the standards
impose a limit to the total maximum energy stored in a paralleled connected group to 4659
kVar. In order not to violate this limit, more capacitor groups of a lower voltage rating
connected in series with fewer units in parallel per group may be a suitable solution. However,
this may reduce the sensitivity of the unbalance detection scheme. Splitting the bank into 2
sections as a double Y may be the preferred solution and may allow for better unbalance
detection scheme.

Grounded Wye-Connected Banks

 Grounded wye capacitor banks are composed of series and parallel-connected capacitor
units per phase and provide a low impedance path to ground. Figure 50 shows typical
bank arrangements.
 Advantages of the grounded capacitor banks include:
 Its low-impedance path to ground provides inherent self-protection for lightning surge
currents and gives some protection from surge voltages. Banks can be operated without
surge arresters taking advantage of the capability of the capacitors to absorb the surge.
 Offer a low impedance path for high frequency currents and so they can be used as
filters in systems with high harmonic content. However, caution shall be taken to avoid
resonance between the SCB and the system.
 Reduced transient recovery voltages for circuit breakers and other switching
equipment.

73
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei
Electrical Power & Machines Dept. ‫ﻗﺴﻢ ھﻨﺪﺳﺔ اﻟﻘﻮى واﻵﻻت اﻟﻜﮭﺮﺑﯿﺔ‬
Faculty of Engineering ‫ﻛﻠﯿﺔ اﻟﮭﻨﺪﺳﺔ‬
Cairo University ‫ﺟﺎﻣﻌﺔ اﻟﻘﺎھﺮة‬

Some drawbacks for grounded wye SCB are:

 Increased interference on telecom circuits due to harmonic circulation.
 Circulation of inrush currents and harmonics may cause mis-operations and/or over-
operation on protective relays and fuses.
 Phase series reactors are required to reduce voltages appearing on the CT secondary
due to the effect of high frequency, high amplitude currents.

Multiple Units in Series Phase to Ground – Double Wye

When a capacitor bank becomes too large, making the parallel energy of a series group too
great (above 4650 kvar) for the capacitor units or fuses, the bank may be split into two wye
sections.
The characteristics of the grounded double wye are similar to a grounded single wye bank.
The two neutrals should be directly connected with a single connection to ground.
The double Wye design allows a secure and faster unbalance protection with a simple
uncompensated relay because any system zero sequence component affects both wyes equally,
but a failed capacitor unit will appear as un unbalanced in the neutral. Time coordination may
be required to allow a fuse, in or on a failed capacitor unit, to blow.

Figure 50: Grounded Wye Shunt Capacitor Banks

74
Utilization of Electrical Energy - EPM 402B
Power Substations
Dr. Mohamed Shafei