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Distance Protection Applicationfor Wind Farms Final
Distance Protection Applicationfor Wind Farms Final
Wind Farms
Contents
1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 2
8. Revisions ..................................................................................................................................... 9
1. Introduction
Applications that would traditionally use directional overcurrent and earth fault relays now use dis-
tance protection IEDs for faster clearing times, improved security and better selectivity. The wide-
spread use of numerical IEDs has increased the application of distance protection to lower volt-
ages, including distribution and sub-transmission feeders. Many such systems may be impedance
grounded instead of solidly grounded.
Distance relays are normally applied in a step-distance scheme at any voltage level. A source of
problems for distance relays on the Wind Farm MV system is the inclusion of a current-limiting im-
pedance in the neutral of the source transformer. The voltage drop across this impedance during
earth fault conditions affects the voltages seen by the distance protection both in faulty but as well
in the healthy phases. This may also affect the polarizing voltage used by the distance relay.
Extensive use of power cables in such Wind Farm MV system increases capacitive earth fault cur-
rent component. This capacitive earth fault current component in combination with used grounding
principle might also cause a problem for traditional distance protection which is primarily designed
for protection of high voltage overhead lines in a solidly grounded power system.
Thus, distance protection in the faulty feeder but even one installed in the healthy feeders might
have difficult operating condition in Wind Farm MV systems during and earth-fault and some spe-
cial measures must be taken in order to get correct performance from distance protection.
2. Problem Description
Typical single line diagram of an offshore wind farm is presented in Figure 1.
The complete wind farm is connected via a grid transformer (GT) and long HV, under-water sea ca-
ble to onshore HV transmission grid. In case of an onshore windfarm GT will be connected directly
to the HV Grid. Note that this document is applicable to both types of Wind Farms.
The Wind Farm MV system, which typically operates at 33kV or 66kV level, is grounded via a neu-
tral grounding transformer (NGT) and a neutral grounding resistor (NGR). The earth fault current on
MV side is then limited to a certain value (e.g. typically in-between 600A to 2500A primary) and is
dominantly resistive in nature due to NGR and NGT sizing. However, installation sites do exist
where NGR is completely omitted and only NGT is used. In such installations this earth-fault current
component then becomes inductive in nature. For such system without NGR it is suggested to use
Alternative Solution given in Section 5.
Array cable feeders are going out from the Wind Farm MV bus and each of them collects power
produced by several wind turbine generators (WTG), as shown in Figure 1. Such array cable feed-
ers can be up to 40km long especially when 66kV voltage level is used. When an earth fault hap-
pens in one array cable feeder quite large capacitive ground fault current contribution from parallel
connected healthy array cable feeders will be present. This capacitive earth-fault current compo-
nent from each healthy feeder varies but in extreme cases it can be up to 100A primary per 33kV
feeder and even up to 400A primary per 66kV feeder.
However please note that this will only improve the operation of the traditional distance protection
zones. In order to verify if this is the complete solution one need to do dynamic simulations under
worst operating scenarios. Therefore, it is also strongly recommended to always implement the ap-
plication configuration solution proposed in the following section as well.
First the logic as given in Figure 3 shall be used to detect that a genuine forward earth fault has
happened in the protected feeder.
The associated signals with AND gate used in Figure 3 are described in the list below:
1. “67N-STFW-EF4PTOC” signal shall come from the directional feature of the earth-fault
protection function EF4PTOC [2]. The pickup current for this directional element shall be
set to 20% of the earth fault current component determined by NGT and NGR sizing. The
RCA angle for the EF4PTOC function shall be set to 0˚ (or even to -5 in order to increase
the margin towards the capacitive EF current in the healthy feeders). This signal shall ver-
ify that a resistive earth-fault current component from the NGR is measured in the pro-
tected feeder.
3. “Ph-Gnd 59-START-OV2PTOV” signal shall come from the phase over-voltage function
OV2PTOV [2]. This function shall be set to measure Ph-Gnd voltages. Its pickup level shall
be set to 125%. This signal shall verify that a high voltage is detected in at least one of the
three phases. During an earth fault two Ph-Gnd voltages will typically exceed this set level.
4. “Ph-Ph 27-START-UV2PTOV” signal shall come from the phase under-voltage function
OV2PTOV [2]. This function shall be set to measure Ph-Ph voltages. Its pickup level shall
be set to 75%. This signal shall verify that a low Ph-Ph voltage is detected among any two
phases. Note that this binary signal is inverted! Consequently, its pickup prevents opera-
tion of this logic because it indicates that a multi-phase fault has happened in the protected
MV system and during such condition this logic shall not be allowed to operate.
Once the forward earth fault is detected the logic as shown in Figure 4 shall be used in order to se-
cure proper operation of all forward looking distance protection zones in case of an earth fault.
At the same time the signal “Forward-EF-Detected” shall be connected to built-in disturbance re-
corder and relevant LED indication in order to facilitate IED testing and commissioning. If required,
it can be also connected for reporting to SCADA system via the chosen communication protocol.
Figure 4: Additional directional supervision logic for each forward Distance Protection Zone
One additional AND gate, as shown in Figure 4, shall be added for each forward-looking distance
protection zone. In this document it is assumed that three forward looking zones are used within
the IED. Consequently, three AND gates as shown in Figure 4 shall be implemented in application
configuration. The associated signals with AND gate used in Figure 4 are described in the list be-
low:
2. “STNDZx-DISTANCE-PROT” signal shall come from the relevant zone of the distance pro-
tection function. This signal indicates that a non-directional start has been given from the
relevant distance protection zone.
3. “STZx-DISTANCE-PROT” signal shall come from the relevant zone of the distance protec-
tion function. This signal indicates that the relevant distance protection zone has started in
forward direction. Note that this binary signal is inverted in the logic shown in Figure 4 and
consequently it shall have logical value zero in order for this logic to operate.
4. Output signal from the AND gate shall be connected to a settable timer. This time shall be
set accordingly (i.e. the same time delay) as for associated forward looking distance pro-
tection zone. The only exception would be the Zone 1 which typically has no intentional
time delay (i.e. delay is set to 0.0s). It is recommended to add small time delay (e.g. 30ms)
for this timer for Zone 1 in order to avoid any possible racing issues for the involved binary
signals during fault clearing in some other feeder in the same MV power system.
5. “TRIP_Zx-Ph-Gnd_#2” signal shall indicate that ground distance protection with revised
directional criterion has operated.
Note that above described logic works in parallel with standard ground distance protection zones
which perhaps will still operate for majority of the fault cases. The standard ground distance protec-
tion zone will also operate during cross-country faults.
Signals “TRIP_Zx-Ph-Gnd_#2” shall be connected to feeder breaker trip logic, built-in disturbance
recorder and LED indications in order to facilitate IED operation, testing and commissioning. If re-
quired, this signal shall be also connected for reporting to SCADA system via the chosen communi-
cation protocol.
By implementing this logic in the Distance Protection IED [2] the proper operation of the distance
ground element during earth fault in an array cable feeder will be ensured. Therefore, it is strongly
recommended to implement such application configuration logic for wind farm installations.
To achieve this functionality the Phase preference logic function shall be properly configured in ACT
and connected to the distance protection. Then for Phase preference logic function parameters
shall be set as shown in the list below:
3. Required time delay for IN release (for example “tIN=0.000s”). Note that for more challeng-
ing applications (e.g. capacitive feeder EF current close to the set level) a small-time-delay
(e.g. 0.025s) can be used in order to avoid transient pickup of this element during EF in-
ception.
By using this simple approach security of distance protection is assured. However, note that ACT
solution shown in Section 3.2 still shall be implemented for Wind Farm where MV systems is
grounded via resistance.
5. Alternative solution
It shall be noted that the array cable feeder zero sequence circuit is completely independent from
the WTG low-voltage side due to Dy connection of the power transformers which are installed in all
wind turbines, as shown in Figure 1. Therefore, the phase-to-ground distance protection measuring
loops can be just switched off and depending on MV network grounding only a certain directional
EF protection can be used as main protection against earth-faults in the feeders.
Note that the phase-to-phase loops within the distance protection function shall still be used as the
main protection against the multi-phase faults in the array cable feeder.
The only consequence of such simple solution would be that an earth fault in a delta winding of one
of WTG transformers will also cause disconnection of the whole array feeder. Probability that the
EF is within a delta winding is quite small but if such risk is not acceptable then one of the following
two solutions are possible:
1. Set EF4PTOC function with a time delay of 150ms. That will give opportunity for the in-
stantaneous EF protection installed on the HV side of the Dy power transformer inside
WTG and associated CB to clear the EF within the delta winding.
2. Set EF4PTOC function with a time delay of 50ms. That will give opportunity for the instan-
taneous EF protection installed on the HV side of the Dy power transformer inside WTG to
send a GOOSE message and block the array feeder EF protection in case that the EF is
located within the WTG transformer delta winding. Note that such GOOSE blocking mes-
sage then needs to be arranged from every WTG installed along the array feeder.
If required a transient EF protection function (i.e. APPTEF function in REL670 and REL650) can be
additionally used in order to protect array cable feeder against intermittent earth faults.
Consequences of such solutions are the same as the one already explained in the above section.
However, coordination with downstream EF protection might be more complicated for such system.
Fuse U2>/I2<
QB1
FUF SPVC
QA1
51N_67N 4(IN>) 51N IN> 67NT Io> ߰߰TEF
QC9
MET U MET ITHD MET I MET P/Q
Figure 5: REL670 block diagram for Wind Farm Array Cable Feeder Protection
7. Additional Information
7.1. Listing of related documents
Ref # Document Kind, Title Document No
[1] Tsylin, A.; Kruse-Nielsen, R.; Yang, G.; Sedaghat, B.: 'Influence of
Collection Network Parameters on Performance of Distance Protection
Directional Elements in Offshore Wind Farms', IET DPSP Conference,
Liverpool-UK, March 2020
[2] Hitachi ABB Power Grids: 'REL670 Technical Manual' 1MRK 506 370-
UEN Revision M.
[3] Gajić, Z.; Zubić, S.; Kockott, M.: 'Phasor Based Transient EF Protec-
tion', WPRC 2020 Conference, Spokane-USA, October 2020
8. Revisions
Rev. Page (P) Description Date Dept./Init.
Chapt. (C)
[A] Document created 2020-08-25
TPA/ZG
[B] Small Comments Revised, section 4, 5 and 6 added 2020-11-26
TPA/ZG