SUMMARY

GENERATOR BASICS AND ITS VIRTUAL APPLICATIONS IN THE FIELD Governor System Function
The Governor system controls the power applied to prime mover shaft which means operation of fuel rack position on diesel engine or gate/blade position on hydropower plant. The prime mover shaft in turn controls the rotational speed (RPM) or generator output power (MW) and both in case of power plant.Firstly speed is controlled in parallel to large grid and then after paralleling, Governor controls the generator power, not speed. However the difficulty in generator using frequency is that the governor will damage prime mover due to over speed incase excitation of generator failed. For this a backup of mechanical governor or some other means to limit the speed of prime mover is required. WOODWORD series is using an electronic governor and mechanical ball-head type governor in same actuator housing. In this way the lowest speed or power will be in control of engines fuel rack.

Modes of Governor

Droop Mode
As the load increases, the frequency or speed decreases (droop).Speed droop is expressed as percentage reduction in speed (fully loaded gen) versus the speed set point (unloaded gen).For example, if speed set point is 63hz and actual speed is 60hz, the droop is approx 5%((63-60)/63=0.048).The generator power output will remain constant by keeping constant, speed set point, speed droop and grid frequency. When isolated from utility, the isolated system frequency will change with respect to change in load, therefore a change in governor speed is required to return the system to its original frequency. Accordingly each prime mover in system have to maintain the same proportion of share load, each governor will require the same speed setting change.

Isochronous Mode
In this mode, the prime mover and generator will attempt to work on fixed frequency regardless of load it is supplying up to full load capability of generator set. This mode is normally used in isolated system where isochronous governor is responsible for maintaining consistent system frequency.

Both Modes
In isolated system, one prime mover generator operate in speed droop mode and other one in isochronous mode (swing machine). The droop and speed settings of droop machine are adjusted to generate a set amount of power. The power of swing machine will change to follow changes in isolated load demands while steady state load on droop machine will remains same. Maximum load in this mode is limited to the combined maximum output of the swing machine and power output of droop machine. If two generator sets operating in isochronous modes are parallel to the same load in an isolated system one unit will try to carry out the entire load and other will shed its entire load unless the two isochronous governors are connected together with load sharing lines. Load sharing lines take the speed setting of two generators and develop and average set point which all governor use as the target speed set point.

Modes of power system operation Paralleled with utility

In this mode, the generator supplies some of facility electrical needs and utility supplies rest of electrical needs. If generator output is greater than the facility loads, power will be shipped out to utility. There is no significance whether a little power is being shipped out or a little power is taken in at utility interconnect point. This state is analogous to two water sources piped together for users of water. When paralleling electrical generators with utility grid, the utility will control the frequency and act as a large isochronous switching machine absorbing any normal change in load. Usually generator has to be operated in droop mode when paralleled with utility. The governors speed and droop settings are so adjusted that generator supplies a fixed power output. A more modern system with export/import controller and load sharing lines allows the generator to remain in isochronous mode with an adjustable import/export quantity.If the frequency setting of generating unit or system is reduced, the generator output will decrease and utility will supply the difference. Similarly if the frequency setting of generator unit or system is increased, the generator output will increase and utility would reduce its supply of power with no change in frequency. .Isolated from utility Utility is here disconnected from the facility and the cogeneration plant supplies all electrical power to the host facility. Islanding (isolation) is the one of the major concern of the utility for cogeneration plants. In isolated mode, the generator whose governor is in isochronous mode will control the frequency of the isolated system.

Synchronization
Most generators are synchronous and operate in exact step with the grid. Induction generators do not operate in step with the grid but have slip w.r.t grid frequency in proportion to load. A common synchronous generator without the amortisseur windings must have proper phase rotation, proper speed (frequency)and Its voltage phases must be in phase and close to same voltage. A synchroscope and lamps are commonly used to indicate the voltage difference between one phase of the grid and a same phase of the generator. When the lamps are out and synchroscope indicator is at 12 oclock position, the two phases are in phase. Synchronization check relay is commonly used to supervise the automatic synchronizer signal and the manual breaker closure switch

Voltage regulation and excitation control

The excitation control is used to adjust voltage when the generator is not connected to the utility. By Increasing the excitation field, the current increases the generator output voltage and decreasing the excitation field, the current decreases the generator output voltage. Increasing excitation while parallel simply increase the amount of reactive volts-amperes produced by the generator. If other generators do not lower their excitation in response, the entire grid voltage will increase slightly. This increase being so slight will be unnoticed. If the generator was on online at full power and the generator trip occurred, the sudden change in power flow will cause a slight reduction in voltage because of I2 R losses in transmission and distribution lines.

Field problems
Electronic governor versus fuel rack problem Remember that the voltage produced by the meter for certain meter function could damage electronic equipment being tested. Always use appropriate branded meter &leads rated for high voltage. Generator power was hunting regardless of the changes made to the settings on the electric governor control (wood ward EGA, with EGB actuator). The sensitivity and gain setting could be used to make the hunting problem worse but would not eliminate the problem. By using, specified multimeter, one will observe that the signal to the actuator was rock steady with the proper adjustment of the EGA. There must be a problem with a fuel rack sticking a bit. Certainly, look closely at the bearing block supporting the fuel rack shaft and you must found them misaligned causing binding. The bearing was realigned and the unit ran smoothly. Synchronization circuit verification at startup and places of errors To verify the proper functioning of synchronism circuit ,ensure that voltage sticks on A-phase of the line and a phase of the generators, the voltmeter should read zero voltage when the following four conditions are true 1. The position of synchroscope indicator is at 12 o clock position 2. The lamps associated with the synchroscope are out 3. The output contacts of the synchronism check relay close 4. The output contacts of the auto-synchronizer closed For 3 and 4 use buzzers, connected into the breaker close circuit to minimize the disruption of the circuit. The buzzers allow u to keep your eye on the hot stick voltmeter and use one ear for each contact. 1 and 2 may be verified by an associate calling out synchrscope position, an important part of the test is to make sure all four condition are not true when the hot stick voltmeter reads voltage. The test must be repeated on at least one other phase to confirm proper phase rotation but test must be performed on the 3rd phase as well to confirm our results. In addition make a cross phase test from A to B , B to C and C to A. For the cross phase test , all four condition should be met with voltage present and the voltage should read zero at the 4 o clock or 8 o clock synchroscope positions. Recheck of the A-A and B B test at the end of the test is made for its warm feeling value. While eating lunch at a large diesel power plant in the Philippines (20 units ranging in size from 1.5 MW to 7MW in three building), the lights dimmed, the unit running in our building groaned with the strain and then recovered. We jumped up to find a frazzled operator in building one .He had paralleled generator out of phase. The synchronism check relay was an old electromechanical type and gave very narrow window for manual breaker closure (often slid a bit past dead center on the synchrscope). The operators had adjusted the relay so that the contact gap was very small, perhaps only a few millimeter so that the window could as large as possible that was not still enough to allow breaker closure at every attempt because the grid was weak and its frequency was shifted about by tens of hertz as the operator tried to adjust the speed of the slow to respond the diesel. Their habit was to take the cover of synchronism check relay and manually help the disk turn to allow breaker closure. The situation was worse than that because their habit degenerated into holding the breaker control switch closed and then using their knee to pull the disk over when the synchroscope indicated an in phase condition. You can now figure of what happened ;with the cumulative effect of a knee on the disk every breaker closure the disk bearing a bit rough and the contact

was already closed when the operator turn the breaker control switch to close position(more than 120 degrees out of phase). We inspected the end winding of the generator and fortunately found no change. Unexpected generator breaker closure because of poor cct design with poor maintenance practice

The circuit shown in the figure is simplified version of the circuit which allowed a breaker closure on a diesel generator while the diesel and generator were out of service for maintenance. The diesel technician at the engine control panel had several wires disconnected to perform test on the engine panel. Two of these wires touched each other and breaker closed. Fortunately the over current relay opened the breaker quickly and there was no apparent damage. The two wires marked on the sketch the positive side of the trip circuit came into contact with the negative side of the cable from close circuit. The result was power to the breaker closing coil with no contact in series. The contact from the engine panel was moved to top of the circuit and the engine technician will request the breaker be racked out or its control fuses removed for future work. The utility demanded safety lockout switch for a generator Safety lockout switch gave a false sense of security, we installed it as per utility demand.. This outdoor enclosed switch would be an extra thousand dollar cost to the project. The utility demanded it to have control over the gas turbine generator breaker for emergencies or for line maintenance. We felt the switch would give a false sense of security and was little advantage to walking an extra twenty feet to ask the operator to trip the generator and rack out the generator breaker. We explained that we require the breaker be racked out and locked to perform maintenance safety and that a control switch was not as good as a lock.

SUMMARY

In an isolated system prime mover generator may operate in droop mode and isochronous mode. The drooped machines are controlled by setting the value of droop and speed to get desired output power. As the isolated system load reduces with respect to output of droop resultantly system frequency is reduced, swing machine will trip on reverse power. If two generators are operated in isochronous mode parallel to load then One generator carries the entire load Other shed its entire load Operation power system has two modes parallel and isolated. Parallel generators with grid determine the frequency. Grid utility helps in controlling frequency and acts as isochronous swing machine absorb any normal change in load. Generally generator operated in drooped model when parallel with utility grid. The set points are not exactly the same as grid frequency if the generator operator in isochronous mode parallel to grid. As result prime mover will move to either full power or reverse power. Frequency of isolated system is controlled by generators governor in isochronous mode. Induction generators dont operate in steps with grid but have slips with respect to grid frequency in proportion to load. Connection Criteria of generator with grid is as under: It must be at proper speed It must have proper phase rotation Its voltage phases must be in phase and close to same voltage The synchronization check relay supervises the automatic synchronizer signal and manual breaker closure switch. Excitation control adjusts the voltage when generator is not connected to the grid. As excitation field increases generator output increases and vice versa. When generator is parallel to grid the voltage is fixed. Reduction of voltage due to change in power flow occurred as generator trip required. In emergency diesel generator (EDG) supply power to an isolated grid separated from utility grid. The island is created by opening switchgear feeder breaker and closing of generator breaker. Damages related to generators and its mountings are mainly during initial startup. Several techniques are used to determine the synchronism between circuits but the most effective one is phase to phase hot stick voltmeter. When voltage stick on phase line and phase generator voltmeter deflect zero voltage under these conditions The position if synchroscope indicator is at 12 oclock position The lamps associated with synchroscope are out The output contacts of the synchronism check relay is close The output contact of auto-synchronizer close Hot stick voltmeter reads voltage as above mentioned conditions are not true.