Acceleration of distance protection second zone: A non-pilot method based on the healthy phases data

• Published in: Electric power systems research 2023-03, Vol.216, p.109086, Article 109086
• Main Authors: Panahi, Habib, Bohluli Oskoue, Ali, Sanaye-Pasand, Majid, Hashemi, Sayyed Mohammad
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Accelerated tripping; Circuit breaker; Distance protection; Non-pilot protection; Second zone acceleration
• ISSN: 0378-7796; 1873-2046
• DOI: 10.1016/j.epsr.2022.109086

•Proposing a new non-pilot solution to speed up the second zone protection of distance relays.•Detecting the remote circuit breaker operation (RCBO) using the healthy phases data.•Developed method for both single- and three-pole circuit breaker (CB) mechanisms.•Investigating the proposed algorithm with various simulations besides some experimental tests.•Proposing an immune scheme to the CT saturation and CVT transients. Nowadays, power systems are operated closer to their stability margins and therefore, the need for faster protection algorithms is escalated. The second zone of distance protection is conventionally set to operate with some lengthy delay, which increases the fault clearing time for the end part of the protected line. Therefore, the acceleration of zone-2 for internal faults can remarkably increase the speed of line protection. This practice is traditionally performed by pilot protection systems, which rely on communication channels. This paper proposes a new non-pilot solution to this challenge using only local measurements. A phasor-based algorithm is proposed to detect the remote circuit breaker operation (RCBO) using the healthy phases data. The proposed method has been developed for both single- and three-pole circuit breaker (CB) mechanisms, which makes it practical for transmission and sub-transmission lines. Thanks to using the healthy phases data, the proposed method is immune to the current transformer saturation and capacitor voltage transformer transients. The performance of the proposed method is simulated and investigated in various critical situations besides some experimental tests. The obtained results approve the efficiency and robustness of the proposed method for different scenarios, e.g. noisy conditions, evolving faults, and parallel lines.