Classification of transmission lines

Transmission lines are classified as short, medium and long. When the length of the line is less
than about 80Km the effect of shunt capacitance and conductance is neglected and the line is
designated as a short transmission line. For these lines the operating voltage is less than 20KV.

For medium transmission lines the length of the line is in between 80km - 240km and the
operating line voltage wil be in between 21KV-100KV.In this case the shunt capacitance can be
assumed to be lumped at the middle of the line or half of the shunt capacitance may be
considered to be lumped each end of the line.The two representations of medium length lines are
termed as nominal-T and nominal- π respectively.

Lines more than 240Km long and line voltage above 100KV require calculations in terms of
distributed parameters.Such lines are known as long transmission lines.This classification on the
basis of length is more or less arbitrary and the real criterion is the degree of accuracy required.

Performance of Transmission Lines - Efficiency and Regulation

The performance of a power system is mainly dependent on the performance of the transmission
lines in the system. It is necessary to calculate the voltage, current and power at any point on a
transmission line provided the values at one point are known.

The transmission line performance is governed by its four parameters - series resistance and
inductance, shunt capacitance and conductance. All these parameters are distributed over the
length of the line. The insulation of a line is seldom perfect and leakage currents flow over the
surface of insulators especially during bad weather. This leakage is simulated by shunt
conductance. The shunt conductance is in parallel with the system capacitance. Generally the
leakage currents are small and the shunt conductance is ignored in calculations.
Performance of transmission lines is meant the determination of efficiency and regulation of lines.
The efficiency of transmission lines is defined as

The end of the line where load is connected is called the receiving end and where source of
supply is connected is called the sending end.

The Regulation of a line is defined as the change in the receiving end voltage, expressed in
percent of full load voltage, from no load to full load, keeping the sending end voltage and
frequency constant.
 Short Transmission Line - Equivalent circuit and Phasor diagram
The equivalent circuit and vector diagram of a short transmission line are shown in the figure
given below. In the equivalent circuit short transmission line is represented by the lumped
parameters R and L. R is the resistance (per phase) L is the inductance (per phase) of the entire
transmission line. As said earlier the effect of shunt capacitance and conductance is not
considered in the equivalent circuit. The line is shown to have two ends: sending end (designated
by the subscript S) at the generator, and the receiving end (designated R) at the load.

The phasor diagram is drawn taking Ir, the receiving end current as the reference.

The terms with in the simple brackets is small as compared to unity, using binomial expansion
and limiting only to second term
Vs ≈ Vr + IrR cosΦr + IrX sinΦr

Here Vs is the sending end voltage corresponding to a particular load current and power factor
condition. It can be seen from the equivalent circuit that the receiving end voltage under no load
is same as the sending end voltage under full load condition
i.e Vr(no load) = Vs . Therefore

where Vr and Vx are the per unit values of resistance and reactance of the line.From the
equivalent circuit diagram we can observe that
Vs = Vr + Ir ( R + jX) = Vr + IrZ

Is = Ir

In a four terminal passive network the voltage and current on the receiving end and sending end
are related by following pair of equations

Vs = AVr + BIr
Is = CVr + Dir

Comparing the above two sets of equations, for a short transmission line A = 1, B = Z, C = 0, D =
1. ABCD constants can be used for calculation of regulation of the line as follows:

Normally the quantities P,Ir and cosΦr at the receiving end are given and ofcourse the ABCD
constants.Then determine sending end voltage using the relation Vs = AVr + BIr. Vr(no load) at
the receivind end is given by Vs/A when Ir = 0.

Medium Line Approximation

 Normal -π Representation
 Normal- T Representation

Medium transmission lines are modeled with lumped shunt admittance. There are two different
representations - nominal- π and nominal-T depending on the nature of the network. These two
are discussed here one by one.
Nominal- π Representation
In this representation the lumped series impedance is placed in the middle while the shunt
admittance is divided into two equal parts and placed at the two ends. The nominal- π
representation is shown in Fig. 2.3. This representation is used for load flow studies, as we shall
see later. Also a long transmission line can be modeled as an equivalent π -network for load flow
studies.
 Fig. 2.3 Nominal- π representation.

Let us define three currents I1 , I2 and I3 as indicated in Fig. 2.3. Applying KCL at
nodes M and N we get

Therefore from (2.11) and (2.12) we get the following ABCD parameters of the nominal- p
representation
Nominal- T Representation
In this representation the shunt admittance is placed in the middle and the series impedance is
divided into two equal parts and these parts are placed on either side of the shunt admittance.
The nominal-T representation is shown in Fig. 2.4. Let us denote the midpoint voltage as VM .
Then the application of KCL at the midpoint results in
 Fig. 2.4 Nominal-T representation.

Rearranging the above equation can be written as

Now the receiving end current is given by

Substituting the value of VM from (2.16) in (2.17) and rearranging we get

Furthermore the sending end current is

Then substituting the value of VM from (2.16) in (2.19) and solving

Then the ABCD parameters of the T-network are

 Long Line Model
For accurate modeling of the transmission line we must not assume that the parameters are
lumped but are distributed throughout line. The single-line diagram of a long transmission line is
shown in Fig. 2.5. The length of the line is l . Let us consider a small strip Δx that is at a
distance x from the receiving end. The voltage and current at the end of the strip
are V and I respectively and the beginning of the strip are V + ΔV and I + Δ I respectively. The
voltage drop across the strip is then ΔV . Since the length of the strip is Δx , the series impedance
and shunt admittance are z Δx and y Δx . It is to be noted here that the total impedance and
admittance of the line are

Fig. 2.5 Long transmission line representation.

From the circuit of Fig. 2.5 we see that

-------1

Again as x  0, from (1) we get

--------2

Now for the current through the strip, applying KCL we get

--------3

The second term of the above equation is the product of two small quantities and therefore can be
neglected. For x  0 we then have

-----------4
Taking derivative with respect to x of both sides of (2) we get

---------5

Substitution of (4) in the above equation results

--------------6

The roots of the above equation are located at ±√( yz ). Hence the solution of (6) is of the form

----------7

Taking derivative of (7) with respect to x we get

-----------8

Combining (2) with (7) we have

-----------------9

Let us define the following two quantities

---------10

--------------11

Then (7) and (9) can be written in terms of the characteristic impedance and propagation constant as

---------12

---------13

Let us assume that x = 0. Then V = VR and I = IR . From (12) and (13) we then get

-----------14
 -----------15

Solving (14) and (15) we get the following values for A1 and A2 .

Also note that for x = l we have V = Vs and I = IS . Therefore replacing x by l and substituting the values
of A1 and A2 in (12) and (13) we get

-------------16

----------17

Noting that

We can rewrite (16) and (17) as

------------18

----------------19

The ABCD parameters of the long transmission line can then be written as
Generalized Constants ABCD

VS  AVR  BI R

I S  CVR  DI R

A B C D

Short TL 1 Z 0 1

 YZ   YZ   YZ 
Nominal T 1   Z 1   Y 1  
 2   4   2 

 YZ   YZ   YZ 
Nominal  1   Z Y 1   1  
 2   4   2 

z Y
Long TL cosh YZ sinh YZ sinh YZ cosh YZ
Y Z