POWER SYSTEM PROTECTION AND SWITCHGEAR

PROTECTION OF TRANSFORMERS

Dr. BHAVESHKUMAR BHALJA

DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING

1
 Introduction
Faults in transformer can be categorized by:
1.Incipient faults
2.Internal faults
3.External faults
1. Incipient Faults
They are also known as minor faults and do not affect
the transformer immediately. However, if they are
allowed to persist for a longer period of time then they
can transfer into internal faults within the transformer.
2
 Reasons for Occurrence of Incipient Faults
a) Leakage of Oil
 Due to leakage of oil in transformer tank, oil level will
drop and in the worst case connections to bushings
and parts of winding will get exposed to air.
 This increases winding temperature which in turn
damage the insulation of the winding.
 Oil level indicator is used in conservator tank to detect
this abnormalities.

3
 Reasons for Occurrence of Incipient Faults
b) Deterioration of oil level
 As load changes, temperature of oil changes which
affects the oil level. Usually, oil tank is completely filled
whereas conservator tank is half filled. The unfilled
portion is kept to allow changes of oil level.
 The conservator tank extracts air via breather so that
moister cannot enter into the oil as otherwise dielectric
strength of oil gets deteriorated. The breather contains
oil cup and silica gel. The moisture is absorbed at two
stages 1st in oil cup and 2nd in silica gel.
4
 Reasons for Occurrence of Incipient Faults
c) Failure of cooling system
 Oil and winding temperature will increase due to
failure of cooling system. It may happen due to failure
of oil pump, failure of fan or radiator blockage.
 Oil temperature indicator and winding temperature
indicator is used to detect these situations.

5
 Reasons for Occurrence of Incipient Faults
d) Inter-turn fault
Shorting of few turns of one of the winding cannot be
detected by relays. This can increase winding
temperature due to local overheating. In the worst
case, this can transfer into major fault.

6
 Reasons for Occurrence of Incipient Faults
How to detect Incipient Faults?
Incipient faults can create a heat which decomposes
the oil into gases which are inflammable in nature. This
condition is detected by gas operated relays.

7
 Gas Operated Relay
 Buchholz Relays
 This type of relay is used only in those transformers
which contain conservator tank as it is connected in a
pipe that is between the main tank and the conservator
tank.
 It consists of an oil-tight container having two internal
floats. These floats operate and actuate mercury
switches which in turn gives alarm or tripping. The relay
is full of oil and the floats remain engaged in seats due
to buoyancy.
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 Buchholz Relays
 Working of Buchholz Relays:
• During incipient fault, gas is generated in the form of
small bubbles and pass upwards through the relay to the
conservator tank. In this process, they become trapped in
the housing of the relay and the oil level falls.
• The upper float is no longer under the upward thrust of
oil. Hence, it falls down and tilts the mercury switch
which in turn shorts the two contacts.
• This issues an alarm indicating that a serious fault is
slowly developing.
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Buchholz Relays

10
 Buchholz Relays
• In case of serious fault in the transformer, the gas
generation is in much larger quantity.
• The oil is displaced in the relay by the gases towards
the conservator tank.
• Due to this, the baffle plate is deflected by the force of
oil and gas mixture tilts the lower float and finally the
mercury switch.
• This will energise the trip coil of breaker and the
breaker isolates the transformer from the supply.
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 Buchholz Relays
 Drawbacks of Buchholz Relays:
• The vibration and shocks caused by some reasons
may mal-operate the relay.
• Minimum operating time is 0.1 sec which is
considered slow.
• It is limited to applications for protection against
incipient faults and non-electrical faults.

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 2. Internal Faults in Transformer
1. Overcurrent Protection LV HV

 When cost of differential relays

are not justified (small
transformers), overcurrent
protection is used in transformer
for protection against short
circuit.
 Overcurrent relays are usually
used to provide back-up
protection in transformers.

13
 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault Protection

• The HV side of Δ-Y x’mer is normally Y connected and the

LV side is Δ connected. The Vph of a Y connected HV
winding is reduced to 0.707 times and per phase current
carried out by LV winding is reduced to 0.707 times.

14
 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault Protection

• If the neutral of the star connected HV winding is isolated

or grounded through high impedance (non effectively
earthed), the voltage of healthy phases increases.
• The voltage will be equal to line voltage in case of an
isolated neutral and 80% of line voltage in case of high
impedance grounding depending upon value of
impedance.
15
 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault Protection
• This voltage rise is not limited to the insulation of a
transformer only but also affected line insulators of lines
emanating from a substation. The cost of insulation is
very high to cope up with this higher voltage stress.
• The solidly grounded system do not suffer from this
disadvantage. However, the magnitude of earth fault
current will be very high. However, considering
economics, HV systems are normally solidly (effectively)
grounded.
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 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault (REF) Protection
 Necessity
 In case of earth fault on star side of delta-star
transformer, zero-sequence current is not reflected
on delta side.
 Therefore, differential protection is less sensitive for
such faults and hence, separate earth fault
protection is required.

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 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault Protection (External fault)
 During an external
fault, the fault
current circulates in
the pilot wires and
no current flows
through the relay.
 Hence, relay does
not operate.

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 Internal Faults in Transformer
2. Restricted Earth Fault Protection (Internal fault)
 During an internal fault,
the fault current flows
through the neutral CT
and not through the line
CTs.
 Therefore, CT secondary
current flows through
the relay and relay
operates if it exceeds
pick-up value.
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 Internal Faults in Transformer
3. Differential Protection
• The volt-ampere on either
side of the transformer is CT1 CT2

equal. Thus, if CTs on either

side are properly chosen, Transformer

the difference in current

will be almost zero. Differential

• The CTs on either side are relay

collected to form a
circulating current system.
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 I. Circulating Current Differential Protection
 The currents entering
and leaving the
equipment to be
protected are compared.
 If these currents are not
equal, the current equal
to difference of the two
currents flows through
third branch (F2), which
signifies a fault.

21
 I. Circulating Current Differential Protection
 Working
• If there is no internal fault, i.e. normal load or external fault (F1)
condition, both currents I1 and I2 and therefore instantaneous
values of CT secondary currents i1 and i2 will be same in
magnitude and phase relation.
• In an internal fault condition (F2), the balance of the currents I1
and I2 is disturbed i.e. I1≠I2. Hence i1≠i2 and the differential
current (i1-i2) will flow through the relay.
• If this current is higher than relay pick-up, the relay will operate
isolating the transformer from the system.

22
 Problems in Circulating Current Differential Protection
 Polarity of CTs
• The polarity of CT is very important in differential
protection, because otherwise sum of two currents (i1 +
i2) will flow through the relay (mal-operation).

23
 Problems in Circulating Current Differential Protection
 Unequal Lead Length du to Location of CTs and Relays:
• Protected equipment and CTs are located in the
switchyard (transformer and busbar). The relay is
installed in the control room.
• The control wiring is required to be done. These wires
are known as pilot wires and the currents i1 and i2 are
known as circulating pilot currents.
• The voltage drop on each side of CT is unequal. Hence,
spill current flows through the relay.

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 Problems in Circulating Current Differential Protection
 Non-identical CT Saturation Characteristics:
• In practice, the characteristics of two CTs never coincide
exactly even if they are purchased from the same
supplier. This may cause spill current through relay even
when primary currents are equal (no internal fault). If
this spill current exceeds pick-up of the relay, an
undesirable operation may occur.
• This spill current is especially large for a heavy external
(through) fault.
• Remedy is to use biased differential protection scheme.
25
II. Biased or Percentage Differential Protection

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 II. Biased or Percentage Differential Protection
 Working
• This scheme has two coils. (i) restraining/bias coil, which
restrains the operation of the relay. (ii) operating coil,
which produces operating torque for the relay.
• The operating coil is connected at the midpoint of the
restraining coil.
• If the restraining coil has N turns, both currents (i1 and i2)
flows through half turns (N/2). Hence the average
restraining current will be equal to (i1+i2)/2.
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 II. Biased or Percentage Differential Protection
 Relay Settings:
• The relay has two type of settings.
• (i) Basic or sensitivity setting: It is the value of the
operating coil current above which the relay can operate.
It is often termed as percentage of rated current of a
relay.
• (ii) Bias setting: It is defined as the ratio of minimum
current through operating coil for causing operation to
the average restraining current. %bias = i1 − i2 ×100
(i1 + i2 ) / 2
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 II. Biased or Percentage Differential Protection
• If the pick-up ratio (i1-i2)/ 3.0

Differential current (i1-i2) (p.u.)

((i1+i2)/2) is more than pre-set
% bias and if the current(i1-i2) Operate
2.0
exceeds basic setting, the relay
operates.
• In case of external faults, there 1.0
Non-operate
can be high spill current (i1-i2).
But (i1+i2)/2 will also be high 0.2
reducing the pick-up ratio 1.0 2.0 3.0 4.0
below the bias setting, making Through bias current (i1+i2)/2 (p.u.)

the relay stable.

29
 Factors to be considered for Transformer Protection
a) Line current transformer primary rating
• The transformer voltage and current rating is different
for primary and secondary.
• Therefore primary rating of the CTs used in primary and
secondary side are different, whereas the secondary
current can be of the same level.
• However, CTs have some standard primary and
secondary current ratings.
(50/100/150/200/250/300/350/400 etc)
30
 Factors to be considered for Transformer Protection
a) Line current transformer primary rating
• A CT with either the rated current or more than that is
chosen. Owing to this fact, there is a mismatch in the
secondary current. In the differential protection
scheme, this mismatch is to be taken care of and the
relay should not operate for this unbalanced current.
• For example, for a 100 MVA, 220 kV/132 kV, delta/star
transformer, the CTs chosen will have the ratio of 300/1
A and 450/1 A.
31
 Factors to be considered for Transformer Protection
(b) No load current of the transformer
I P = K × IS + I0
• CT ratios are selected based on nominal
transformation ratio hence some spill current will
always flow through the relay because of no load
current component.
• No-load current is of the order of 1-2% of the rated
current and the basic setting of the relay can take
care of this component.
32
 Factors to be considered for Transformer Protection
(c) Inherent phase shift of currents in transformer
• The primary and secondary currents are not in phase in
three-phase transformer connected in delta-star.
• It is evident that current IR and Ir are in phase because
two windings are mounted on same limb.

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(c) Inherent phase shift of currents in transformer

Line currents are given by:

I RL = I R − I B
I YL = I Y − I R
I BL = I B − I Y

It is clear form this vector

diagram that secondary line
current Ir leads the primary
line current IRL by 30°.
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(c) CT connections to cover phase shift in transformer
• The CT connection should be made in such a way
that it compensates the phase differences
between the line currents on each side of the
power transformer.
• Differential current should be same (magnitude
as well as phase wise).

35
(c) Remedy to cover phase shift in transformer
• The CTs on the star side of the transformer are
connected in delta, whereas on the delta side of the
transformer, they are connected in star.
• Moreover, this will eliminate the zero-sequence current
on the star side while the zero sequence component on
the delta side will not produce current outside the delta.
• The CTs on both sides would need to be connected in
delta if the transformer were connected star/star.
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Differential Protection

Biased
differential
Relay

37
Differential Protection

38
(d) Bias to cover tap changing facility and CT
mismatch
• In most of the cases, tap changing transformers
are used, and thus, the CTs can be chosen on the
basis of a fixed tap (nominal tap).
• Transformer operation on any tap other than this
will result in mismatch of CT secondary current.

39
(d) Bias to cover tap changing facility and CT mismatch
• This mismatch of current will be over and above the
mismatch due to the use of standard ratio CTs.
• This unbalanced current may be sufficient to cause
the differential relay to operate. In practice, the
mean tap is taken as the nominal tap.
• A biased differential relay may avoid unwanted
operation of the relay under such circumstances.

40
 (e) Interposing CTs (ICTs) to compensate mismatch of line
CTs
• Ideally, differential current should be zero.
• However, it is not equal due to mis-match in CT ratio. If
this gap is not much, the bias can take care of this and the
relay remains stable against this mismatch.
• However, the situation is more serious once the gap in the
two currents is more either because of the standard CT
ratios or because of the tap changing transformer.

41
 (e) Interposing CTs to compensate mismatch of line CTs
• For the tap changing transformer, the CTs are selected on
the basis of the nominal tap, which is generally a central tap.
• For any other tap position, the CT mismatch will be more.
To address this, the bias should be either dynamically
changed on the basis of the operating tap or set
corresponding to the worst case scenario.
• The higher bias will adversely affect the relay sensitivity of
the transformer operation at other taps.
42
(e) Interposing CTs to compensate mismatch of line CTs
• Interposing CTs are used to match the relay currents
under through-load conditions corresponding to the
ratings of the transformer.
• For a tap changing transformer, this is achieved
corresponding to the nominal tap. For any other tap
position, the bias can take care of CT mismatch.

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(f) Magnetising Inrush
• Magnetizing inrush is a condition when the transformer
draws a very large current from the supply while the
load current is either zero or of nominal magnitude.

44
(f) Magnetising Inrush
• This flux is symmetrical or asymmetrical in nature which depends
on switching instant of a voltage signal given to the primary
winding of a transformer.
• If switching of a transformer is carried out at the instant when
the voltage wave is at its peak value, then the flux is symmetrical
in nature and is given by

• where, ∅maxis the maximum value of steady state flux in the core
of a transformer and ∅R is the residual flux present in the core of
the transformer.
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(f) Magnetising Inrush
• In this situation, the B-H curve operates in the linear region.
Hence, the magnitude of magnetizing inrush current is
restricted to a normal value.
• Since the flux is directly proportional to the current causing it,
magnetizing inrush results in a large flux/flux density in the
core with the objective of keeping the core volume minimal.
Transformers are designed to operate just below the knee
region of the B–H curve of the core material. During normal
operation, the flux is within the linear region of the B–H
curve.
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Symmetrical FluxMagnetic flux in steady state Hysteresis
Flux

time Current

Voltage

time
time

47
(f) Magnetising Inrush
• Conversely, if the switching of a transformer is done at
an instant when voltage wave is passing through zero,
then the flux is asymmetrical in nature and it is given by,

• In this condition, upper point of B-H curve gets

elongated (it does not remain in linear region). Hence, in
order to produce the same amount of flux, the
magnitude of current becomes very high.
48
 Differential Protection
Flux

Asymmetric Hysteresis
al
magnetic
time current
flux

Some problems caused by inrush currents:

• Damage to the transformer
• False operation of transformer protections Inrush Current
• Adverse effects on power quality
• Direct current problems time
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(f) Magnetising Inrush
• During magnetizing inrush, a large flux results in
saturation of the transformer core.
• Thus, the flux waveform will be asymmetrical with
respect to the time axis and will contain a DC value.
• The nature and magnitude of the inrush current will
be decided by the direction and magnitude of the
residual magnetization flux in the core and switching
instant.
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e) How to detect Magnetising Inrush? (it is not a fault)
• On harmonics analysis, it is found that this flux consists
of a significant amount of second and odd harmonics.
Name of Component Percentage of Fundamental Component
DC Component 55
2nd Harmonic 63
3rd Harmonic 26.8
4th Harmonic 5.1
5th Harmonic 4.1
6th Harmonic 3.7
7th Harmonic 2.4

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e) Magnetising Inrush
• Conventionally, during energization, current-magnitude-
based protective relays are blocked for the initial few
cycles till the input current settles down around the rated
current. Several solutions are as follows:
I. Harmonic restraint
II. Harmonic blocking
III. Resonance blocking
IV. DC bias
V. Wave-shape monitoring
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