Substation Earth Grid Analysis and Design in CLP Power

H K Wong Shihe Chen K L Chan Asset Management Department, Power Systems Business Group CLP Power Hong Kong Limited, Hong Kong (e-mail: wonghk@clp.com.hk, schen@clp.com.hk, klchan@clp.com.hk ) Abstract
Substation earth grids are designed to provide a path for the currents flowing into the general mass of earth under normal and fault conditions. Due to the high load density and short circuit length, the fault level in CLP Powers supply system is very high. In order to mitigate the potential risks caused by the rise of earth potential (ROEP) associated with the fault currents, the earth grids of substations have to be appropriately designed such that the ROEP and other associated risk are within acceptable safety levels. Due to the scarcity of land in Hong Kong, most of the circuits are underground cables and substations are compact GIS substations which is small in size and therefore high in earthing resistance. Special characteristics of CLP Powers system and special risk mitigation measures have to be taken into consideration in the analysis and design of the substation earth grids.

Substation earth grids are designed to provide a path for currents flowing into the general mass of earth under normal and fault conditions. The load density in CLP Powers supply area is high and the circuit length is short. Therefore, the system fault currents, in particular earth fault currents, are very high. A large fault current passing into the earth grid of a substation would cause a high rise of earth potential (ROEP) and pose a risk to the safety of people and equipment. In order to mitigate the potential safety risk, the earth potential profiles must be properly controlled and the earthing resistance of the earth grid must be lowered to a safe value. However, low earthing resistance is some times difficult to achieve when the occupied area of the substation earth grid is small. Due to the scarcity of land in Hong Kong, almost all of CLP Powers transmission substations are equipped with Gas Insulated Switchgear (GIS). A compact GIS substation is typically only about one fifth of the size of an open type conventional substation. Special measures to reduce the earthing resistance are required to meet the earthing safety requirements. Many of CLP Powers substations are connected with a lot of cable circuits. The metallic cable sheath of these cable circuits are usually earthed at the earth grid of the substations. These cable sheaths provide parallel paths for the fault currents to flow back to the power sources and thus reduce the currents passing through the earth grid. These cable sheaths therefore effectively reduce the ROEP and should be taken into consideration in the earth grid analysis and design. Those special characteristics of CLP Powers substations require special considerations and risk mitigation measures in the analysis and design of the substation earth grid. This paper introduces the authors experiences in substation earth grid analysis and design to ensure the safety of the personnel and equipment in the substations.

Keywords
Substation Earth Grid Design, Rise of Earth Potential, Step Potential, Touch Potential, Transfer Potential

1. INTRODUCTION CLP Power operates a vertically integrated electricity generation, transmission and distribution business to supply electricity to about 80% of population in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. CLP Power has an installed generating capacity of 8,263MW and demand of about 6.3GW in 2004. CLP Powers transmission network comprises more than 1,500km of 400kV and 132kV circuits and about 200 transmission substations. CLP Powers 400kV network is shown in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1 CLP Powers 400kV Transmission System

2. SAFETY LIMITS OF SUBSTATION EARTH GRID DESIGN Human bodies are vulnerable to electric current as small as ten mA. When current passing through the body exceeds 50 mA, ventricular fibrillation, stoppage of the heart, or inhibition of respiration might occur and cause injury or even death. Under earth fault conditions, the hand-to-hand, hand-to-feet or foot-tofoot potential differences of a person working in a substation would cause current flowing through his/her body. The safety limits of substation earth grid design are mainly based on these considerations. 2.1 Tolerable body current The impact of electric currents to human body is related to the energy absorbed by the body. As the energy is proportional to the time the currents flowing through the body, the fault clearing time is a factor in determining the allowed current on human body. For a person weighted 50 kg, the threshold current causing fibrillation of the heart would be 116 mA [1], if the fault clearing time is 1.0 seconds. 2.2 Step and touch potentials However, body current is not a convenient parameter in substation earth grid analysis and design. Usually, only the earth potential of the grid and the surface potential profile are calculated in an earth fault analysis. Therefore, the tolerable body currents are converted into tolerable body voltages for two typical shock situations, i.e. step potential and touch potential [1]: Estep50 = 0.116 x (1000 + 6 x Cs x s) / ts Etouch50 = 0.116 x (1000 + 1.5 x Cs x s) / ts Cs = 1- 0.09 x (1-/s) / (2 x hs + 0.09) where Estep50 Etouch50 is the step potential limit in V for a person weighted 50kg is the touch potential limit in V for a person weighted 50kg is the surface layer derating factor is the resistivity of the surface material in ohm-meter is the duration of shock current in seconds is the resistivity of the earth beneath the surface material in ohm-meter is the thickness of the surface material in meter (1) (2) (3)

Emm-touch50 = 116 / ts 2.3 ROEP

(4)

Other than the step and touch potentials, safety limit is also imposed on the maximum allowable ROEP. The International Consultative Committee for Telegraphs and Telephones (CCITT) recommends limits on the potentials imposed on the communication lines [3]. These limits are also adopted in Hong Kong. These ROEP limits are: ROEP < 650V (5)

for substation connected to highly-reliable power lines whose fault clearing time does not exceed 0.5 seconds and is less than 0.2 seconds under most cases. ROEP < 430V (6)

for substation connected to other less reliable power lines with a longer fault clearing time. Based on our survey results on the practice of substation design, most North American utilities do not have a ROEP limit. For the other utilities having a ROEP limit, the ROEP limit is either as high as several thousand volts or calculated based on the allowable shock current and assumed body resistance. 2.4 Earthing resistance A low earthing resistance is essential to contain the ROEP and the step and touch potentials. Some standards stipulate an upper limit of earthing resistance, e.g. 0.5 or 1.0 ohm, as the safety requirement. The relationship between ROEP and the earthing resistance of a substation can be expressed by a simple Equation (7): ROEP = Rs x Ig where Rs Ig is the earthing resistance of the substation is the current flowing into the earth through the earth grid (7)

s ts hs

Cs

For GIS substations, a person touching a GIS enclosures may be exposed to metal-to-metal touch potential. The safety limit of metal-to-metal potential can be derived by substituting s = 0 in Equation (2) which results in the following equation: 2

However, Ig itself is a function of Rs. A lower earthing resistance would increase the overall fault current and the ratio of fault current flowing into to the earth (Ig) as well. Besides, there is no simple relationship between the earthing resistance and the shock current passing through a human body. Therefore, earthing resistance can be adopted as a safety limit only after detailed assessment of all shock situations and the specified value must be on the safe

side. Such a limit could be applied to a group of substations with similar design. 2.5 Safety limits adopted in CLP Power CLP Power adopted a set of safety limits with due consideration of their practicality and accuracy. In our substation analysis and design, the step potential, touch potential and ROEP limits discussed in Section 2.2 and 2.3, i.e. Equation (1) (7), are adopted as the safety limits.

mitigation measures would be required to manage the risk. The details of these tasks are discussed below. 3.1 Soil resistivity measurement The soil resistivity of the substation site can be obtained by measurement. There are several measurement methods including variation of depth method, two-point method and four-point method. CLP Power adopted the four-point method because of its accuracy and its capability of measuring the resistivity of different soil layers without the need to drive very long electrodes into the earth. The fourpoint method is depicted in Fig. 3.

3. PROCESS OF SUBSTATION ANALYSIS AND DESIGN The substation earth grid analysis and design consists of a number of interrelated tasks as shown in the flow chart in Fig. 2. Soil Resistivity Measurement

I V
V

V a

Earth Grid Design Earth Grid Analysis

Fig. 3 Four-point Method When the length of the electrodes is much shorter than the distance a between them, the average soil resistivity to the depth a can be calculated by the following equation.

Not met
Safety Limits

Met
Earthing Resistance Measurement

= 2 a V / I
where V I a

(8)

Met
Safety Limits

Not met
Mitigation Measures Fig. 2 Process of Earth Grid Analysis and Design The process starts from the measurement of the soil resistivity at the site. Based on the measurement results, a preliminary earth grid design will be developed to provide a basis for the analysis of the fault current distribution and ground potential profile. If the calculated ROEP and step and touch potentials can meet the safety limits, the earth grid will be installed as designed. Otherwise, the design will be improved. After the installation, a site measurement of the earthing resistance and a safety analysis are required to assess whether any deviation of the actual earthing resistance from the expected value. If there is any,

is the reading of the measured voltage in V is the test current in Ampere is the separation of the electrodes in meter is the soil resistivity in ohm-meter

In order to get a more accurate estimate of the earth potential profile and earthing resistance of the substation, several measurements are required with different separations of the electrodes a, in particular when two-layer model is used in the safety analysis. The soil resistivity in CLP Powers supply area varies drastically from about 101 ohm-meter in reclaimed land to more than 103 ohm-meter in hilly area. 3.2 Typical earth grid design The typical earth grid of a CLP Powers substation consists of both horizontal earth mat and vertical rods. The horizontal earth grid is formed by 2 x 70mm2 strand copper conductors covered by about 0.5m deep of soil. The typical separation of the earth conductors is 6-8 meters. The earth grid covers the whole site of the substation. Horizontal earth grid is very effective in 3

controlling the ground surface potential gradient to minimize the step and touch potentials. If the step and touch potentials exceed the safety limits, one effective way is to reduce the separation of the earth grid by installing additional earth conductors. For a substation site with multiple layers of soil, the lower layers usually have a more stable and lower soil resistivity because they are closer to the water table and contain more moisture. In particular to GIS substation, the limited substation size is not sufficient in dissipating fault current so vertical earth rods are required. The vertical earth rods are normally 4.8 meter long made of copper clad steel core. Such type of earth rod has the advantage of both high mechanical strength and corrosion resistance. 3.3 Earth grid analysis Based on the typical earth grid design and the soil resitivity measured at the site, the earthing resistance of the substation can be calculated either by one of the commercially available software or following the formulas provided in [1]. Due to the variation of substation size and soil resistivity, the calculated earthing resistance of CLP Powers substations are usually in the range of 0.1 ohm to several ohms. The largest challenge in earth grid analysis is the calculation of the earth fault current distribution in the metallic component connected to the earth grid during the faults. Most of the CLP Powers transmission substations are in urban area and due to the high load density, there are a lot of cable circuits connected to CLP Powers substations. The metallic cable sheath of these cable circuits are usually earthed at the earth grid of the substations. These cable sheaths provide parallel paths for the fault currents to flow back to the power sources and thus reduce the currents flowing into the earth grid of the substation where the fault occurs. These cable sheaths therefore effectively reduce the ROEP, and therefore the step and touch potentials. As shown in Fig. 4, If = Ig + Is1 + Is2 where If Ig Is1 Is2 is the overall earth fault current is the grid current flowing into the earth is the current flowing back to the source through cable sheaths is the sheath current flowing to the earth through the earth grid of other substations (9)

indicated by Is1, part of the fault current will flow to the earth through the earth mats of other substations. Only a small part of the current Ig will pass through the earthing resistance Rs which is the cause of a rise of earth potential in the substation. For a typical substation with many cable sheaths, the Ig equals only 10-20% of the overall earth fault current.
Metallic Cable Sheath

Source

I s1 Rs

If I s2 Ig

Fig. 4 Earth Fault Current Distribution In order to take full consideration of the impacts of various fault current paths, the cable sheaths and other metallic conductors such as ground wires connected to the substations should be modeled in the simulation of the earth fault current distribution. It should be noted that the mutual impedance between the cable core and the sheath have to be considered in the calculation of the sheath current Is1 to have an accurate assessment. 3.4 Simulation of earth potential on ground surface Due to the complexity of the shape of the earth grid, the earth potential profile on the ground surface has to be simulated by special software tools developed for this purpose. Fig 5 is an example of earth potential profile on the ground surface. The maximum potential difference between any two points one step away is the step potential. The maximum difference between the potential of a metallic part and the ground potential one arm away from the metallic part is the touch potential. The potential on the earth grid is the ROEP.
m

Earth Grid

Earth Potential Gradient

m

Due to the strong mutual impedance between the cable core and its metallic sheath, most of the fault currents will flow back to the source on the cable sheath as

Fig. 5 Example of Earth Potential Profile

3.5 Safety performance of the earth grid and risk mitigation measures The calculated step potential, touch potential and ROEP will be assessed against their respective safety limits as calculated by Equation (1)-(7). Usually there are 3 possible outcomes: a) The ROEP, the step potential and touch potential are all within their respective safety limit, the substation earth grid will then be installed as designed. b) The step and touch potentials exceed the safety limits, additional horizontal earth conductors or some vertical earth rods will be added to control the surface potential gradient. One other risk mitigation measure is to cover the substation surface with a layer of crashed-stone which has a resistivity of several thousand ohmmeters. In Equation (1) and (2), the increase of s can effectively increase the safety limits for both step and touch potentials. c) The ROEP exceeds its safety limit. In this case increasing the number of horizontal earth conductors may not be very effective. More vertical earth rods will be installed to reduce the overall earthing resistance of the substation. The number, the location and the length requirements for the vertical earth rods are dependent on the need and the resistivity of lower layers of soil. The earth rods are most effective when they are installed along the perimeters of the earth grid, in particular atthe corners of the substation. The earth rods are most effective when they reach the water table or the layer of low resistivity soil. However, when the water table or the layer of low resitivity soil is deep, it is very difficult to drive a long earth rod into the earth to reach them. In such a case, small bore holes are drilled to install vertical earth rods. The bore holes will then be back filled with low resistivity material like Bentonite (typically 2.5 ohm-meter at 300% moisture) to maximize the effectiveness of the earth rods. If the vertical earth rods are not very effective or the cost is too high, the overall earthing resistance of substation can be reduced by connecting its earth grid to that of a nearby substation. When such a connection is to be installed, the reliability and security of the earth grid links have to be considered. It is preferable to link the two earth grids at two or more different points and the connectors should be buried in separate trenches as shown in Fig. 6.

Earth Grid Bonding Conductors

Earth Grid

Fig 6 Bonding Two Earth Mats at Different Points In some cases, the above risk mitigation measures can be either ineffective and infeasible, or they are too expensive to implement. If only the ROEP is over limit and nothing can be done to reduce it, the risk imposed by the ROEP can be contained by electrically isolating the substation earthing system from the conductors from remote locations such as telephone line through the installation of isolation transformers and/or other measures. 3.6 Earthing resistance measurement Although the simulated safety performance of the earth grid is satisfactory, after the installation of the earth grid, the actual earthing resistance may be different from the calculated value on which the earth fault current distribution is simulated. A site measurement of the stand-alone earthing resistance of the earth grid is required to determine whether the earthing resistance is within the design value and whether any additional risk mitigation measures are necessary. The earthing resistance is measured by the Fall-ofPotential method. Details of this method can be found in [2].

4. CONCLUSION The high fault level and the small size of the compact GIS substation imposes some difficulties in the analysis and design of earth grids meeting the safety limits. However, through assessing the bypassing effects of cable sheaths and adopting special risk mitigation methods in the analysis and design of CLP Powers earth grid,, such as bore hole backfilled by Bentonite, connecting to other earth grid, isolation transformer on communication circuits, etc., the risks associated with substation earthing can be properly managed.

Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the Management of CLP Power for the encouragement and endorsement for the publication of this paper.

References
[1] IEEE Std 80-2000, IEEE Guide for Safety in AC Substation Grounding. [2] IEEE Std 81-1983, IEEE Guide for Measuring Earth Resistivity, Ground Impedance, and Earth Surface Potential of a Ground System. [3] Directives Concerning the Protection of Telecommunication Lines against Harmful Effects from Electricity Lines, International Telegraph and Telephone Consultative Committee, 1963