Failure Risk Assessment of Surge Arrester Using Paralleled Spark Gap

Abstract

Surge arresters are usually used to protect distribution feeders against randomly distributed lightning overvoltages. However, there is a probability of surge arrester failure due to an increase in its absorbed energy over the withstand capability. This paper experimentally and theoretically evaluates the application of a compound overvoltage protection scheme to avoid this failure. The compound overvoltage protection consists of an installed spark gap in parallel with an existing surge arrester to limit the risk of surge arrester failure. The experimental evaluation is performed by applying standard lightning impulse voltage waveform, 1.2/50 µs according to IEC Standard 60060-1. The evaluation is carried out without and with sparkgap adjusted at different lengths. The energy stress of the surge arrester with and without sparkgap is theoretically carried out using the ATP/EMTP software considering an overhead distribution feeder. The statistical evaluation for the failure risk assessment is performed using the MATLAB software. The results indicate that the installation of the spark gap in parallel with the surge arrester relieves the thermal stress on the surge arrester, and thus eliminates any risk of surge arrester failure using the proposed coordination.

Externally gapped line arrester performance in high voltage transmission line using frequency grounding system: Absorbed energy and expected life assessment

“…Surge arrester selection with an appropriate capability of energy absorption is difficult. Extremely non‐linear voltage stress caused by lightning strikes and voltage–current characteristics of the arresters are the main restriction factors [37]. Failure probability analysis of a surge arrester is difficult and depending on several parameters including arrester characteristic, surge arrester installation point, impact point of the lightning strokes, and lightning parameters.…”

“…Surge arrester energy absorption capability and its energy stress can be used to investigate the arrester failure risk. It is assumed that the lightning energy distribution is the normal density and so the probability density of energy occurrence can be estimated as follows [37]: $$\begin{equation}f(Es) = \frac{1}{{\sqrt {2\pi } \sigma }}\exp \left[ { - \frac{{{{(E - {E_{50\% }})}^2}}}{{2{\sigma ^2}}}} \right]\end{equation}$$where $$f(Es)$$ is energy occurrence probability density, E 50% is the energy with 50% probability density of occurrence and σ is the standard deviation.…”

Modeling Rogowski Coils for Monitoring Surge Arrester Discharge Currents

“…Surge arresters are commonly used to protect the distribution systems from lightning overvoltages by discharging lightning strokes. However, they can be burned out due to excess discharge energy behind their capabilities, especially under direct lightning strokes [7,8]. Therefore, monitoring the surge arrester discharge current is essential for estimating the discharge energy and protecting it from burning out.…”

Ferroresonance Overvoltage Mitigation Using Surge Arrester for Grid-Connected Wind Farm

“…The arresters can be damaged and burn out if the absorbed energy exceeds the withstand value. This is happening with the extreme direct lightning strokes, where the overvoltages reached 30 MV in the distribution networks as addressed in [13,14]. Therefore, there are recent studies presented to keep excess energy out from the arresters and keep them away from burning out [13,14].…”

“…This is happening with the extreme direct lightning strokes, where the overvoltages reached 30 MV in the distribution networks as addressed in [13,14]. Therefore, there are recent studies presented to keep excess energy out from the arresters and keep them away from burning out [13,14]. Comparing the direct lightning overvoltage values with the ferroresonance overvoltage, there is a big difference.…”