SWITCHGEAR AND PROTECTION

CHAPTER-1
1. Principle of power system protection (3 hours syllabus)
1. Protection system components and its terminologies
2. Basic requirement of protection scheme
3. Need of protection scheme in power system
4. Back up protection, coordination, protection zone

Basic Background:
A. Power System
 The purpose of an electric power system is to generate and supply
electrical energy to consumers.
 The power system should be designed and managed to deliver the
energy to the utilization point with both reliability and
economically.
 Capital investment involved in power system for generation,

transmission and distribution is so great so that proper protection

system is mandatory.

B. Need of protection system in power system

 It helps to detach the faulty section from the system to make the

rest of the portion work without any disturbance.

 It helps to protect the system from great economical loss and also

ensure human safety as well.

  It helps to improve system stability and ensure reliable and
uninterrupted power flow in the system.

C. Switchgear
 Switchgear is a combination of electrical disconnects switches,

fuses or circuit breakers used to control, protect and isolate

electrical equipment.

D. Nature and Causes of fault

Any fault in electrical system is nothing but the defect in its
electrical circuit which makes current path directed from its
intended path. There are various types of faults: a) Single line to
ground fault b) Double line to ground fault c) line to line fault.
There are various causes of fault which are discussed below:

 Transformer fault: Insulation failure, faults in tap changer,

overloading
 Switchgear fault: Insulation failure, leakage of air/oil/gas,
mechanical defect, lack of maintenance
 Transmission line fault: Severe lightening stroke, heavy wind, rain
and snowfall, aging of conductor, vehicle colliding with tower,
birds on transmission line etc.

Let’s get into the syllabus:

1. Protection System components and its terminologies

a. Current and voltage transformers: They are used to step down the
high voltages and currents of the electrical power system to
convenient levels for the relays to deal with it.
 b. Protective relays: They are used to sense the fault and initiate a
trip, or disconnect.
c. Circuit breaker: They are used to open/close the system based on
relay and auto recloses commands.
d. Batteries: They are used to provide power in case of power
disconnection in the system.
e. Communication channels: They are used to allow analysis of
current and voltage and to allow remote tripping of equipments.

General working system of protective relay

 When a short circuit occurs at point F on the transmission line, the
current flowing in the line increases to an enormous value.
 This results in a heavy current flow through the relay coil, causing
the relay to operate by closing its contacts.
 In turn, closes the trip circuit of the breaker, making the circuit
breaker open and isolating the faulty section from the rest of the
system.
 This way, the relay ensures the safety of the circuit equipment
from damage and normal working of the healthy portion of the
system.
2. Basic requirement of protection scheme
a. Reliability: It is the assurance that the protection system will
perform correctly. It is the ability of the protection system to
operate correctly and efficiently. It demands the certainty of a
correct operation of the designed system on occurrence of any
fault. Various factors are to be considered to ensure reliability.
 Quality of components used
 Maintenance schedule
 Design principle
b. Selectivity: This feature aims at maintaining the continuity of
supply system by disconnecting the minimum section of the
network necessary to isolate the fault.
The property of selective tripping is also known as
“discrimination”.
This is the reason for which the entire system is divided into
several protective zones so that minimum portion of network is
isolated with accuracy.
c. Sensitivity: To detect even the smallest fault, current and
abnormalities and operate correctly at its setting. The protective
system should be sufficiently sensitive so that it can operate
reliably when required.
Mathematically, the sensitivity is expressed by a factor called
sensitivity factor Ks. It is the ratio of minimum short circuit current
in the protected zone to the minimum operating current required
for the protection to start.
Ks= , where Ks=sensitivity factor, Is= minimum short circuit
current in the zone, Io= minimum operating current for the
protection.
d. Speed: Minimum operating time to clear a fault in order to avoid
damage to equipment. The speed of protection system consists of
primarily of two time intervals of interest.
 Relay time: This is the time between the instant of
occurrence of the fault to the instant at which relay contacts
open.
 Breaker time: This is the time between the instant of closing
of relay contacts to the instant of final arc extinction inside
the medium and removal of fault.
e. Simplicity and Adequacy: Minimum protective equipment and
associated circuitry to achieve the protection objectives. It is
economically unviable to have a 100% protection of the entire
system in concern. Therefore, the cost of the designed protection
system varies with the criticality and importance of the protection
zone.

3. Need of protection scheme in power system

(Already discussed above)

4. Back up protection, coordination, protection zone

a. Zones of a protection system
 Protection zone is defined as the part of the power
system which is protected by a certain protective scheme.
 An electric power system is divided into several zones of
protection. Each zone of protection contains one or more
components of a power system in addition to two circuit
breakers.
 When a fault occurs within the boundary of a particular
zone, then the protection system responsible for the
 protection of the zone acts to isolate equipment within that
zone from the rest of the system.

Fig: Overlapping Zones

 The circuit breakers are inserted between the component of the

zone and the rest of the power system. Thus, the location of
circuit breaker helps to define the boundaries of the zone of
protection.
 Different neighboring zones of protection are made to overlap
each other, which ensure that no part of the power system
remains without protection. The zone which is unprotected is
 called dead spot. Zones are made overlapped to ensure the
absence of dead spot in power system.

b. Types of protection ( primary and back-up protection)

 Primary protection: Below is the power system protection scheme
which is designed to protect the power system parts and
components. As shown in below fig, each line associated with
over current relay that protect the lines from faults. So, if a fault
happens on any line, it will be cleared by its relay and circuit
breaker. This is called primary or main protection and acts as a
first line defender. The service record of primary relaying is very
high with well over 90% of all operations being correct. But this is
not always the case, sometimes faults are not illuminated by the
primary or main protection system i.e. circuit breaker and relay
system because of trouble within the relays, circuit breakers or
wiring system in different conditions. In those conditions,
Secondary or backup protection system does the required job.
 Back-up protection: Back-up protection is very important for
stable and reliable power system. As we know that, it is not
possible to design a 100% secure and efficient system because
there are possibilities of failure in the connected CTs, PTs, circuit
breaker etc. in the system. If it happens, then it will destroy our
whole switching system. If the primary protection operation falls
into trouble, then secondary protection disconnects the faulty
part from the system. Moreover, when we disconnect primary
protection for testing or maintenance purpose, then secondary or
back-up protection will act as primary protection. In the above fig,
relay “X” (1 Sec time setting) provides backup protection for each
of the four connected lines to the main bus. In addition; a larger
part is disconnected then when primary relaying functions
 correctly. Therefore, greater emphasis should be placed on the
better maintenance of primary relaying which is economical.

Methods of backup protection system

1. Relay Backup protection: In this scheme, a single breaker is
used by both primary as well as backup protection but the two
protective systems are different.
2. Breaker Backup protection: In this method, separate breakers
are provided for primary and backup protection. Both the types
of breakers are at the same station.
3. Remote Backup protection: In this method, separate breakers
are provided for primary and backup protection. The two types
of breakers are at the different stations and are completely
isolated and independent of each other.
4. Centrally Co-ordinate Backup protection: In this method,
primary protection is at various stations. There is a central
control room and backup protection for all the stations is at
central control room. Central control continuously inspects the
load flow and frequency in the system. If any element of any
part of the system fails, load flow gets affected which is sensed
by the control room. The control source consists of a digital
computer which decides the proper switching action. This
method is also called centrally controlled backup protection.

IOE QUESTIONS (chapter-1)

1. What are the basic requirements of a protection scheme? (2073
Bhadra, 2072 magh)
2. Draw and explain the protection zone diagram for a sample
power system network. (2072 Ashwin)
3. What do you understand by a zone of a protection? Discuss
various zones of protection for a modern power system. (2071
Bhadra)
4. Why protection system is needed in electrical power system?
State and explain various causes of electrical faults. ( 2070
Bhadra)
5. State various methods of backup protection. (2073 magh)

( Written and Compiled by Anjan Adhikari)