EE450: High Voltage Engineering

Lecture 27, 28

Farhan Mahmood, PhD

Department of Electrical Engineering
UET, Lahore

January 25, 2017

Outline

Partial Discharges

• Electrical method of PD detection

• Apparent charge
• Partial discharge detection methods
˗ Straight detection methods
˗ Balanced detection methods

Page 2
Electrical Method of PD Detection

• Electrical PD detection method is based on the appearance of a PD (current or

voltage) pulse at the terminals of a test object.

• Consider a solid or liquid dielectric between the two electrodes A and B, and a gas-
filled cavity.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• The dielectric contains a gaseous cavity having unit relative permittivity. Thus, the
electric strength of the gas is lower than that of a solid dielectric.
• Due to geometry of the material, various capacitances are formed as shown in
figure.
˗ Electric field lines within the cavity are represented by the capacitance Cc is of
the cavity or void.
˗ Electric field lines starting or ending at the void form two capacitances Cb1 and
Cb2 within the dielectric.
˗ All the field lines outside the cavity are represented by Ca1 and Ca2 , that is the
capacitance of healthy portions of the dielectric on the two sides of the void.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• Due to realistic geometric dimensions involved,

˗ Ca = Ca1 + Ca2, and Cb = Cb1Cb2/(Cb1 + Cb2).

˗ Ca >> Cb >> Cc.

• The PD phenomena can be simulated by the equivalent circuit in which the switch S
is controlled by the voltage Vc across the void capacitance Cc, and S is closed only
for a short time, during which the flow of a current ic (t) takes place.
• The resistor Rc simulates the time period during which the discharge develops and is
completed.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• As mentioned, the insulating medium and the void/cavity may be represented by

three capacitances:

˗ Cc = capacitance of void/cavity,

˗ Cb = capacitance of the dielectric which is in series with the void

where d = thickness of the dielectric,

t = thickness of cavity, and
A = cross-sectional area of the cavity disc.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• When the applied voltage to the dielectric is V, the voltage across the void Vv is
given by,

• Since εr > 1, the stress in the void will exceed that in the solid and the breakdown of
the gas in the void will take place.
• When a voltage V is applied, Vc reaches the breakdown strength of the medium in
the cavity (Vi) and breakdown occurs. Vc is called the discharge inception voltage.
• This means that when the voltage across the void increases above the discharge
inception voltage, the PD activity will start in the void.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• This would cause the breakdown of the cavity and the first discharge will appear in
the form of sharp pulse of current during the rising part of the applied voltage during
positive half cycle.
• The cavity will discharge instantaneously (this discharge is a gas discharge) creating
electrons as well as negative and positive ions, which are driven to the surfaces of
the void and the voltage across the cavity would fall to PD extinction voltage.
• The spark gets extinguished and again the voltage rises till breakdown occurs again.
• This process repeats again and again, and current pulses as shown, will be obtained
both in the positive and negative half cycles.
• In this way, a series of high frequency pulses (each of duration of the order of 100
ns) are produced due to multiple discharges.

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

ic (t)

Page 9
Electrical Method of PD Detection

• The multiple discharges can cause local degradation of the solid dielectric which
may be progressive and ultimately lead to breakdown of the insulation.
• This discharge current ic (t) cannot be measured because:
˗ We don’t have access to the terminals of the void
˗ The amplitude and duration of the discharge current is very small

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• Let us now assume that the sample was charged to the voltage V, but the terminals
A and B are disconnected from the voltage source.
• When the switch S is closed, the capacitance Cc completely discharges, and the
charge is lost in the system, that is, current ic (t) releases a charge ∆qc = Cc.∆Vc
from Cc, a charge which is lost in the system.
• This will cause a voltage drop of across the cavity ∆Vc and ∆V across the terminals A
and B. Hence,

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Electrical Method of PD Detection

• Since, Cc << Cb,

• This voltage ∆V (although measurable) does not give any information of the charge
discharged which is ∆qc = Cc.∆Vc.
• Therefore, the concept of apparent charge is introduced for PD measurements.

Page 12
Apparent Charge

• In the circuit, the test sampe is connected through a resonance filter to the high
voltage source to prevent any pulses which may originate in the transformer or
bushing capacitance to reach the test sample.
i (t), q

Page 13
Apparent Charge

• When the breakdown occurs in the cavity, a charge is released from the cavity. This
causes a voltage drop across the terminals of the dielectric material.
• During the short interval of cavity discharge, the coupling capacitor Ck releases a
charge or PD current pulse to the test specimen which tries to cancel the voltage
drop ∆Va across terminals A and B of test specimen.
• In this way, the coupling capacitor Ck can only replenish the charge, as the resonant
filter disconnects the test specimen from source.
• Therefore, coupling capacitor acts as a storage capacitor or stable voltage source
during the short time period of partial discharge.
• If Ck >> (Ca+ Cb), the voltage drop is completely compensated.

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Apparent Charge

• The charge transferred by Ck is given by,

• Since,

• The charge q supplied by the coupling capacitor Ck is called apparent charge and
gives a more realistic picture of the discharged quantity.
• The apparent charge can be directly measured and calibrated and is usually
expressed in picocoulombs.

Page 15
Apparent Charge

• The apparent charge (q) of a PD event is the charge that, if injected between the
terminals of the device under test, would change the voltage across the terminals by
an amount equivalent to the PD event.
• Therefore, the apparent charge (q) of a PD pulse is that unipolar charge which, if
injected within a very short time between the terminals of the test object in a
specified test circuit, would give the same reading on the measuring instrument as
the PD current pulse itself (IEC Standard 60270.31).
• The word ‘apparent’ has been introduced because this charge is not equal to the
actual amount of charge locally involved at the site of the discharge or cavity.

Page 16
Partial Discharge Detection Methods

• The electrical partial discharge detection methods are classified as:

˗ Straight method
˗ Balanced method

Page 17
Straight Detection Method

• In straight detection methods, measuring instruments measure the charge released

within the discharging sites of the test specimen.
• Partial discharge measuring instruments available measure the apparent charge,
that is, the charge transfer that takes place at the terminals of the specimen.

Page 18
Straight Detection Method

• The impedance Zm known as detection impedance, is connected in series with the

test specimen, as illustrated in figure (previous slide).
• The signal developed across Zm is passed through a band-pass filter and an
amplifier, and is either displayed on a CRO or counted by a pulse counter.
• A calibrator is used across the detector impedance Zm and the voltage pulse is
calibrated in terms of the charge magnitude of the calibrator. This value is compared
with the voltage pulse recorded to estimate the apparent charge.
• In a narrow band detection scheme, Zm is a tuned parallel L-C circuit tuned to 500
kHz. In a wide band detection scheme, Zm is an R-C network with a bandwidth of
250 kHz.

Page 19
Straight Detection Method

• The sinusoidal voltage and the corresponding ellipse pattern of the discharge are
shown in figure.
• The amplified discharge pulses are displayed oscillographically, superimposed on a
power-frequency elliptic timebase.

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Straight Detection Method

• A typical discharge pattern displayed on the CRO screen of a partial discharge

detector in cavities inside the insulation is shown in figure.
• This pattern of discharge appears on the quadrants of the ellipse which correspond
to the test voltage rising from zero to the maximum, either positively or negatively.
• The discharges usually start near the peaks of the test voltage but spread towards
the zero value as the test voltage is increased beyond the inception level.
• The number and magnitude of the discharges on both the positive and negative
cycles are approximately the same.

Discharge pattern in void

Page 21
Straight Detection Method

• The sinusoidal voltage and the corresponding ellipse pattern of the discharge in a
point-plane spark gap geometry are shown in figure.
• When the voltage applied is greater than that of the critical inception voltage, multiple
pulses appear, and all the pulses are of equal magnitude.

Point-plane gap

Page 22
Straight Detection Method

Page 23
Straight Detection Method

• Limitations of straight detection methods:

˗ Discharges in any part of the test circuit and not within the test sample may be
detected and displayed along with the discharge impulses in the sample. This
implies discharge-free high-voltage sources or the provision of filters on the high-
voltage leads or loose earth connections should be eliminated.
˗ Noise may be picked up from a variety of possible sources having nothing to do
with the test setup (e.g. nearby thyristor-controlled machines, ultrasonic
generators, and arcing contacts).

Page 24
Balanced Detection Method

• Balanced detection methods a work on the principle of Schering bridge employed for
tan δ measurements and are much more sensitive than straight detection methods.
• In this method, the bridges are tuned and balanced at 50 Hz.
• A filter is used across the detector terminals to block the 50 Hz components present.
Signals in the range from 5 to 50 kHz are allowed to pass through the filter and
amplified.
• The CRO gives the display of the pulse pattern. Any external interference from
outside is balanced out, and only internally (test piece) generated pulses are
detected.

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Balanced Detection Method

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