EH2741- Communication & Control in Electric Power

Systems Project Assignment

Part 1 Substation Automation Systems

By
Andrius Maneikis
HannanAfifi
MdShahinur Islam
Pratik Sonthalia

Contents
EH2741- Communication & Control in Electric Power Systems Project Assignment. . .1
Part 1 Substation Automation Systems.................................................................1
1.1 Theory Part: Design a substation automation systems.....................................3
1.1.1 Detailed Substation Design.........................................................................3
1.1.2 Circuit Breaker Maintenance.......................................................................6
1.1.3 Substation protection zones......................................................................12
1.1.4 Protection in Substation............................................................................ 14
1.1.5 Example of Logical Nodes interaction for over-current protection.............17
References................................................................................................................ 20
Appendix.................................................................................................................. 21
List of Figures........................................................................................................ 21
List of Tables.......................................................................................................... 21

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1.1 Theory Part: Design a substation automation systems

Requirements of the substation:
1. 2 incoming Lines with a transformer each
2. 3 feeders for power supply to downstream
The required topology has been described in the diagram below.

Figure 1 Substation Topology Overview

1.1.1 Detailed Substation Design

The substation design is required to comply with the following:
Reliability: Single component failure in the substation should not
interrupt feeder power supply.
Flexibility of maintenance: When you do the maintenance, no power
supply to any feeder should be interrupted.
Cost: Try to minimize the component to reduce the cost of substation.
Measurements: Place the necessary measurements in the system to
fulfill the requirements of the functions you proposed in question c
Various factors shall affect the above requirements of the substation design,
one of which is the arrangement of the buses and switching devices. In an airinsulated substation, the commonly used types of substation bus/ switching
arrangements are [1]:
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
f.

Single Bus
Double bus, double breaker
Main and transfer bus
Double Bus, single breaker
Ring Bus
Breaker and a half
Reliability

Flexibi

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Cost

Single Bus
Double Bus,
double breaker

No
Yes

lity
No
Yes

Main and
Transfer Bus
Double Bus,
single breaker
Ring Bus

No

No

Moderate Cost (1.76)

No

No

Moderate Cost (1.78)

No- single failure

isolates the
component

Yes

Moderate Cost (1.56)more components

Breaker and a
Half

Yes- single failure

isolates the
component, the
failure does not
affect the circuit

Yes

Moderate Cost (1.57)breaker and a half for each

configuration

Least
High Cost- duplicated
components

Table 1: Bus Bar Configurations comparison study

A double-bus, single breaker was initially proposed. However, based on

specific requirements of reliability (single component failure in the substation should
not interrupt feeder power supply), it was rejected and a breaker and a half was
suggested.

Figure 2 Single Line Diagram of a double-bus single breaker system

A double-bus, single breaker would require 6 CB. However,afailure in any of

the circuit breaker shall lead to an interruption in the supply to the feeder or the
generation. Though the component requirement is less for double bus single
breaker and least cost, it does not meet the reliability requirements. Similarly, other
breaker configurations do not completely fulfill the requirements. A comparative
study has been included in the table 1. Instead, a hybrid solution with a breaker and
a half configuration is proposed.

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The detailed design of the hybrid configuration is done on HELINKS and is

shown in Figure 1.
For protection, the design contains 10 circuit breakers and 16disconnecters, 7
current transformers and 2 voltage transformers. The entire system has been
divided into 6 bays.
The measurement components used in the substation have been compiled in the
table 1.
Component Type

Circuit Breakers

Protecti
on

Disconnectors

Component Label
CB1
CB2
CB3
CB4
CB5
CB6
CB7
CB8
CB9
CB10
CB11
CB12
CB13
DS1, DS2
DS3, DS4
DS5, DS6
DS7, DS8
DS9, DS10
DS11, DS12
DS13, DS14
DS15, DS16

Bay Number
Bay1
Bay2
Bay3
Bay4
Bay4
Bay4
Bay6
Bay5
Bay6
Bay6
Bay1
Bay2
Bay3
Bay1
Bay2
Bay3
Bay4
Bay4
Bay4
Bay5
Bay6

Table 2 Protection Components in the substation

Bus Bars
System

Line
Transformer

Bus Bar1
Bus Bar 2
Line 2
Line 1
Line 3
T1
T2

Bay1
Bay2
Bay6
Bay3
Bay5

Table 3 System components in the substation design

Measurem
ent

Current Transformer

CT6
CT5
CT2
CT1

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Bay1
Bay2
Bay3
Bay3

Voltage Transformer

CT3
CT4
CT7
VT1
VT2

Bay5
Bay5
Bay6

Table 4 Measurement components in the substation design

The diagram for the division of the bay has been shown below:

Figure 3Single Line Diagram depicting the bays

1.1.2 Circuit Breaker Maintenance

In the above system, suppose CB1 has reached its lifecycle and needs
maintenance. The assumption is made that the circuit breaker has reached its
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lifetime and can be still operated. Generally, in a breaker and a half configuration,
all the circuit breakers are kept closed normally to increase the redundancy.The
maintenance process will have to be done ensuring that the supply to none of the
feeders is disrupted. The detailed steps have been described below:
1. Initial condition is shown in the figure below. The current flows into Line2
through both CB1 and CB4.

Figure 4Normal Operating Condition for the substation

2. Open CB1. Upon tripping the circuit breaker CB1, the current stops flowing
into Line2 through the circuit breaker CB1. However, it is still being fed
through the circuit breaker CB4 ensuring supply and reliability.

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Figure 5Open CB1- First step for circuit breaker maintenance

3. Once the circuit breaker is open, the disconnectersDS1 and DS2 can be safely
opened.

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Figure 6Open the disconnecters- Step 2 for CB maintenance

4. Remove the circuit breaker CB1 requiring maintenance.

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Figure 7Remove CB1 -Third step for CB maintenance

5. Place the new circuit breaker CB1new in place of CB1.

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Figure 8Place new CB1 -Fourth step for CB maintenance

6. Close the disconnecters DS1, DS2 and then circuit breaker CB1 new. Now the
current flows into the feeder from both the circuit breakers CB1 new and CB4.

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Figure 9Close the disconnecters and CB1newSixth step for CB maintenance

Thus circuit breaker that has reached its lifetime can be replaced without
disrupting the supply.
1.1.3 Substation protection zones
To denote the protection type, the entire design has been divided into a
number of zones. The diagram depicting the zones is shown in the figure.

Page 12 of 22

Figure 10 Zones in the substation design

Each of the above zones deploys its own protection mechanism which has been
summarized in the table below and described the following section.
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Protection
Zones
Zone 1
Zone 2
Zone 3
Zone
Zone
Zone
Zone
Zone

4
5
6
7
8

Zone 9

Protection Types
Over-current
Over-current Protection
Under voltage &Differential
Protection
Differential Protection
Over-current
Over-current Protection
Over-current Protection
Under voltage & Differential
Protection
Differential Protection

Table 5 Protection zones and the corresponding protection type

1.1.4 Protection in Substation

1. Over-current protection
Basic of over-current protection devices are circuit breaker and fuse. Overcurrent protection is widely used in protection of distribution feeders [12. Overcurrent protection is principally used to protect expensive equipment, feeders and
also lines from the enormous/excess current flow. This can be done by setting
threshold current of the relay. Threshold current normally is set above nominal value
to avoid unwanted trip due to high load. Only if current measured by CT (Current
Transformer) is higher than threshold value, over-current relay will send signal to
circuit breaker to trip.
There are several types of over-current relay: Instantaneous over-current,
define time over-current, inverse time over-current relay (IDMT) and also directional
over-current relay. Instantaneous over-current will react in a definite time when
current excess its setting without time delay. Define time over-current has constant
time operation and independent from magnitude of current above the setting.
Inverse time over-current relay (IDMT) operates time-inversely from current
magnitude which means higher current will operate faster than low current.
Moreover IDMT relay also has three additional types: standard inverse, very inverse
and extremely inverse. Directional over-current operates in direction of current
flow and blocks the
opposite
direction [5].
Figure 11Instantaneous over-current, definite time over-current and IDMT relays

In our substation design, over-current protection is implemented to protect

the incoming and outcoming feeder. As depicted in figure 10, there are 3 outcoming
load (line 1, 2 and 3) and 2 incoming feeders. For incoming load, one of the CT in
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input of transformer is used for both differential protection for transformer and also
over-current protection for the line. For outcoming load, each has CT to measure
current flowing. In this case, we assume that all outcoming feeders are identical.
Therefore the settings of the over-current protection are similar for those lines.
In figure x, we take zone protection 7 as an example of over-current
protection. Since we are using half and breaker configuration, we assume each of
the outcoming feeder receive power from both bus bar (bus 1 & bus 2). Therefore,
line 2 is supplied directly from incoming feeder of zone protection 1 and bus bar 1. If
fault is occurred in line2, relay will send signal to CB 1 and CB 4 to trip to isolate
only line 2 (faulted feeder).

Figure 12Substation protection zone 7

2. Differential protection
Differential protection is principally based on comparison between current
flowing into and out from the equipment, either in magnitude or phase. During
normal condition, ideally the current entering and leaving equipment should be the
same. However, fault condition in apparatus will cause significant difference
between entering and leaving current.
Differential protection is implemented for protecting power transformer and
busbars in our substation design. Power transformer, as one of main and expensive
instrument in substation, has to be protected properly to prevent any further
damage when fault occurred in it. The use differential protection provide
advantages in potential transformer such as helping Buccholz relay to detect any
internal fault in transformer outside insulating oil quickly and also protecting faults
outside transformer but inside the differential protection zone of transformer [3]

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To implement differential protection in power transformer, two Current

Transformer is assembled in input and output of power transformer to measure
current of low voltage and high voltage side. As can be seen in figure 10, CT 1 and
CT 2 are placed in the middle of T1 and CT 3 and CT 4 are placed in the middle of
T2. The solution of differential relay is given by

I PI S I T
IT

Where

is threshold setting current of differential relay. In that case if the

difference between input and output current of transformer equal or bigger than
threshold current, relay will active and send trip signal to trip the transformer.

Figure 13Differential protection of Power Transformer (Source: 7 )

In

bus

bar
protection, differential relay is implemented by assembling three CTs connected in
parallel in the line which is connected to the bus bar as input of the relay.
Principally, bus bar should be protected as bus bar availability will determine
performance of substation. If we take example bus bar 1 in zone protection 8, we
can see that there are three CTs (CT 11, CT 12 and CT 13) connected to bus bar 1.
According to KCL (Kirchoff Current Law), during normal condition the current flowing
to relay should be

I 1 +I 2+ I 3=0
Which means no current will flow to relay protection. However, if fault happens
inside protection of zone 8, current flowing to relay will no longer zero and relay will
send trip signal to CB which is connected faulted line.

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Figure 14Differential protection in Bus bar 1

3. Undervoltage protection
Undervoltage relay is type of relay that operates when input voltage drops
below limit value.
Undervoltage relays are typically device which measure
instantaneous value. Therefore, every time the input voltage drops below set point,
instantaneous undervoltage relay should react immediately. Setting of
Instantaneous undervoltage relay depends on the drop voltage and also VT ratio. [4]
In our design, undervoltage relay is implemented to protect bus bar. As
mentioned earlier, availability of bus bar will effect on operation of entire
substation. Hence we use undervoltage protection as backup of differential
protection for protecting bus bar. However, as undervoltage is defined as backup,
time delay and block settings should be set to allow differential relay to operate
first. In implementation of undervoltage protection, each bus baris installed with VT
as input of undervoltage relay (VT 1 for bus bar 1 and VT 2 for bus bar 2). If fault
happens in bus bar, and differential protection fails to operate, undervoltage will
send signal to trip all the feeders connected to the relevant bus bar.

Page 17 of 22

Figure 15Implementation of undervoltage protection in bus bar 2 by placing VT 2

1.1.5 Example of Logical Nodes interaction for over-current protection

For the chosen over-current protection Logical Nodes (LN) are implemented
according to the scheme below. In case there is a short circuit in either of the feeder
lines, two nearby circuit breakers (LN XCBR1 and LN XCBR2) shall open in order to
isolate the fault location from the source lines. The over-current protection LN PTOC
receives sampled values from LN TCTR. LN CSWI is used to control all switching
conditions and check the interlocking from LN CILO1 in bay level and LN CILO3 in
station level. For local/remote control Human Machine Interface (LN IHMI) is used.
[6]

Page 18 of 22

Figure 16Over-current protection scheme

Source Logical Node

Information Attribute

Destination Logical Node

TCTR

TCTR.Amp.instMag

PTOC1

TCTR

TCTR. Amp.instMag
CSWI1.OpOpn.general
CSWI1.OpCls.general

PTOC2

CSWI1

CSWI1.Pos.origin
CSWI1.OpOpn.general
CSWI1.OpCls.general

XCBR1

CSWI1

CSWI1.Pos.origin
CSWI1.OpOpn.general
CSWI1.OpCls.general

XSWI1

CSWI1

CSWI1.Pos.origin
CILO1.EnaOpn.stVal

XSWI2

CILO1

COLO1.EnaCls.stVal
CILO1.EnaOpn.stVal

CSWI1

CILO1

COLO1.EnaCls.stVal
PTOC1.Str.general

CILO3

PTOC1

PTOC1.Op.general
PTOC1.Str.general

IHMI

PTOC1

PTOC1.Op.general
PTOC1.Str.general

CSWI1

PTOC1

PTOC1.Op.general

CSWI2

Page 19 of 22

CSWI2.OpOpn.general
CSWI2.OpCls.general
CSWI2

CSWI2.Pos.origin
CSWI2.OpOpn.general
CSWI2.OpCls.general

XCBR2

CSWI2

CSWI2.Pos.origin
CSWI2.OpOpn.general
CSWI2.OpCls.general

XSWI3

CSWI2

CSWI2.Pos.origin
CILO2.EnaOpn.stVal

XSWI4

CILO2

COLO2.EnaCls.stVal
CILO2.EnaOpn.stVal

CSWI2

CILO2

COLO2.EnaCls.stVal
XCBR1.Loc.stVal
XCBR1.Op.Cnt.stVal
XCBR1.Pos.origin
XCBR1.BlkOpn.origin
XCBR1.BlkCls.origin

CILO3

XCBR1

XCBR1.CBOpCap.origin
XCBR2.Loc.stVal
XCBR2.Op.Cnt.stVal
XCBR2.Pos.origin
XCBR2.BlkOpn.origin
XCBR2.BlkCls.origin

CILO1

XCBR2

CILO2

XCBR2.CBOpCap.origin
CILO3.EnaOpn.stVal
CILO3

COLO3.EnaCls.stVal
CILO3.EnaOpn.stVal

CSWI1

CILO3

COLO3.EnaCls.stVal

CSWI2

IHMI

IHMI

CSWI1

IHMI

CSWI2

IHMI

Table 6 Logical nodes for the over current protection

References
[1] McDonald, John D, Electric Power Substations Engineering, Third Edition, CRC
Press, 2012
[2] Chen, Wai-Kai (eds), The Electrical Engineering Hand Book, Academic Press,
2004

Page 20 of 22

[3]
http://www.electrical4u.com/differential-protection-of-transformer-differentialrelays/, accessed 22 Nov 2014
[4] Sleva, Anthony, Protective Relay Principle, CRC Press, 2009
[5]
http://electrical-engineering-portal.com/types-and-applications-of-over-current
-relay-1, accessed 22 Nov 2014
[6] IEC-62850-5, Communication Network System in Substation, IEC, 2003
[7] Aktaibi et al, Digital Differential Protection of Power Transformer Using Matlab,
Intech, 2012

Page 21 of 22

Appendix
List of Figures
Figure 1 Substation Topology Overview......................................................................3
Figure 2 Single Line Diagram of a double-bus single breaker system.........................4
Figure 3Single Line Diagram depicting the bays.........................................................6
Figure 4 Normal Operating Condition for the substation............................................7
Figure 5 Open CB1- First step for circuit breaker maintenance...................................8
Figure 6 Open the disconnecters- Step 2 for CB maintenance...................................9
Figure 7 Remove CB1 -Third step for CB maintenance.............................................10
Figure 8 Place new CB1 -Fourth step for CB maintenance........................................11
Figure 9 Close the disconnecters and CB1new Sixth step for CB maintenance...........12
Figure 10 Zones in the substation design.................................................................13
Figure 11 Instantaneous over-current, definite time over-current and IDMT relays. .14
Figure 12 Substation protection zone 7....................................................................15
Figure 14 Differential protection in Bus bar 1..........................................................16
Figure 13 Differential protection of Power Transformer (Source: Adel Aktaibi et al, 2 )
................................................................................................................................. 16
Figure 15 Implementation of undervoltage protection in bus bar 2 by placing VT 2 17
Figure 16 Over-current protection scheme...............................................................18

List of Tables
Table
Table
Table
Table
Table

1: Bus Bar Configurations comparison study.....................................................4

2 Protection Components in the substation.......................................................5
3 System components in the substation design................................................5
4 Measurement components in the substation design......................................5
5 Protection zones and the corresponding protection type.............................14

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