IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 40, NO.

1, JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2004 29

Grounding and Ground Fault Protection

of Multiple Generator Installations on
Medium-Voltage Industrial and Commercial
Power Systems—Part 4: Conclusion and Bibliography
Working Group Report
Prafulla Pillai, Senior Member, IEEE, Bruce G. Bailey, Jim Bowen, Gerald Dalke, Bruce G. Douglas, Jay Fischer,
James R. Jones, Daniel J. Love, Charles J. Mozina, Neil Nichols, Clifford Normand, Lorraine Padden, Alan Pierce,
Louie J. Powell, David D. Shipp, Norman Terry Stringer, and Ralph H. Young

Abstract—This paper discusses typical grounding practices and
ground fault protection methods for medium-voltage generator
stators, highlighting their merits and drawbacks. Particular at-
tention is given to applications of multiple generators connected to
a single bus. The paper also provides an overview of the generator
damage mechanism during stator ground faults. Problem areas
associated with each type of grounding are identified and solutions
are discussed. The paper also provides a list of references on
the topic. The paper is intended as a guide to aid engineers in
selecting adequate grounding and ground fault protection schemes
for medium-voltage industrial and commercial generators for
new installations, for evaluating existing systems, and for future
expansion of facilities, to minimize generator damage from stator
ground faults. These topics are presented in four separate parts,
Parts 1–4. Part 1 covers scope, introduction, user examples of
stator ground failure, and theoretical basis for the problem. Part
2 discusses various grounding methods used in industrial appli-
cations. Part 3 describes protection methods for the various types
of grounding and Part 4 provides a conclusion and bibliography
of additional resource material.
elements.
Index Terms—Generator ground fault protection, generator
grounding, ground fault protection, grounding, stator iron
damage.
I. CONCLUSIONS
T HIS paper has shown that the phenomenon that is causing
the reported extreme core burning of faulted generator sta-
tors is based on two factors.
Paper ICPSD-IAS 48–01–P4, presented at the 2002 Industry Applications
Society Annual Meeting, Pittsburgh, PA, October 13–18, and approved for
publication in the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS by the
Power Systems Protection Committee of the IEEE Industry Applications
Society. Manuscript submitted for review October 15, 2002 and released for
publication November 4, 2003.
The authors are members of the Grounding and Ground Fault Protection
of Medium-Voltage Generator Installations Working Group of the Medium-
Voltage Protection Subcommittee, Power Systems Protection Committee, IEEE
Industry Applications Society.
P. Pillai, Chairperson of the Grounding and Ground Fault Protection of
Medium-Voltage Generator Installations Working Group, is with Kellogg
Brown & Root, Houston, TX 77002-7990 USA (e-mail: p.pillai@ieee.org).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TIA.2003.821645
0093-9994/04$20.00 © 2004 IEEE
1) As system complexity has increased, the number of re-
sistor grounds on systems has increased. This has caused
the total available ground fault current to increase. As a
practical matter, the opening time of generator breakers
cannot be made significantly faster than the typical 6
cycles (100 ms for a 60-Hz ystem) value. A major compo-
nent of the burning is, therefore, attributable to the mag-
nitude of current that will flow during this tripping time,
that is, to the number of ground sources on the system.
2) Current that rises through the neutral of the faulted gen-
erator will not be interrupted by tripping the generator
breaker, and will persist for several seconds until the field
demagnetizes. A considerable amount of burning damage
will be done during this time if the generator neutral is
low-resistance grounded.
Therefore, solutions to this problem must involve several
1) The number and ratings of low-resistance grounding
resistors on the system should be kept to a minimum.
Techniques to accomplish this include designing the
system around the concept of “zero-sequence islands”
in which the number and rating of transformer ground
sources within each island is strictly limited, or the use
of a single bus-connected neutral deriving transformer
instead of multiple neutral resistors on multiple power
transformers.
2) The faulted generator should be high-resistance (10-A
maximum) grounded, especially during the time after the
generator breaker opens and while the field excitation
is decaying. If necessary, a hybrid form of generator
neutral grounding may be used in which the neutral
is both low-resistance grounded and high-resistance
grounded. The generator will be low-resistance grounded
during normal operation, but a neutral switching device
is provided to trip this resistor any time that the generator
must be tripped for a stator ground fault. This leaves the
generator high-resistance grounded during the ensuing
30 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 40, NO. 1, JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2004
interval as the field flux decays, thereby limiting the fault
current to a level that will do significantly less damage.
3) If it can be assured that the generator will never be op-
erated alone without being synchronized to the external
power source, then a good solution would be to employ
high-resistance grounding of the generator and low-resis-
tance grounding of the external source. For ground faults
internal to the generator, the low-resistance grounding of
the external source allows quick tripping of the generator
breaker to isolate the fault, leaving the generator high-
resistance grounded, thereby eliminating damages.
4) Another option would be high-resistance grounding of
both the generator and the external sources with the
bus being low-resistance grounded via a grounding
transformer supplied through a breaker. This grounding
method would allow the system to continue to operate
with the uncleared high-resistance ground fault present
if the condition is alarmed and the fault is located and
cleared in a timely manner. However, if adequate high-re-
sistance grounding cannot be achieved, then it would be
necessary to trip both the generator and external source
when there is an uncleared downstream fault. Careful
consideration must be given to all potential normal
and contingency operating scenarios to permit plant
operations to continue in the event of some unexpected
component failures.
It is important that any solution must be carefully engineered
with particular attention in selecting equipment components that
are suitably rated for the application.
Practical solutions on new systems are relatively straight-
forward and involve application of the above-mentioned two
factors. On existing systems the problem of minimizing fault
damage is more challenging. Furthermore, there is no one set
of steps that will suffice for all existing systems. Therefore, it is
necessary to consider carefully the architecture of each system
to arrive at what will almost certainly be a compromise between
the objective of minimizing potential fault damage and certain
other operating objectives.
A serious problem with existing systems is that their archi-
tecture is often complicated by the manner in which they have
evolved over many years. It is also often the case that there is a
perception that this complexity equates with reliability because
it affords many different contingency operating modes. This in
turn can lead to a situation where there is a desire to meet the
grounding criteria mentioned above for all possible operating
arrangements.
Therefore, the first step in identifying a solution for existing
systems is to identify what are the expected realistic operating
modes of the system. That is, while it is certain that the system
is expected to operate normally with everything intact, it is im-
portant to understand what kinds of outage contingencies must
be allowed for.
A reality is that it may be impossible to achieve risk mitiga-
tion for all practical operating conditions of complex systems. In
this instance, it will be necessary to choose between accepting
the risk of machine damage and limiting the number of oper-
ating contingencies that can be accommodated on the system.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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Other Related References
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32 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 40, NO. 1, JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2004
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Prafulla Pillai (M’88–SM’95) received the B.Sc.
(Electrical Eng.) degree from Kerala State Univer-
sity, Kerala, India, in 1967, and the M.Sc. (Electrical
Eng.) degree from Queen’s University, Kingston,
ON, Canada, in 1977.
She was with Fertilizers and Chemicals Company,
India, from 1967 to 1975, primarily designing elec-
trical systems for chemical plants. She was involved
in engineering consulting services in Canada from
1977 to 1980. She was with Ontario Hydro, Canada,
from 1980 to 1993, initially designing utility substa-
tions and later studying electrical power systems in their Research Division. She
joined Brown & Root (now Kellogg Brown & Root), Houston, TX, in 1993, as
Senior Electrical Engineer. She currently holds the position of Senior Technical
Advisor. Her primary responsibilities are in the areas of power system anal-
ysis, protective relay coordination, and relay setting calculations for industrial
installations.
Ms. Pillai is a Registered Professional Engineer in the State of Texas and
in the Province of Ontario, Canada. She holds several positions in the Industrial
and Commercial Power Systems Department of the IEEE Industry Applications
Society and its committees and working groups.