PAUL: DC TRACTION POWER SYSTEM GROUNDING

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dc power to the train propulsion system via third rail or OCS

system. The negative-polarity bus box is physically kept separated from the dc switchgear.
Fig. 1 represents various components of the dc electrification
system including the vehicle. It should be noted that the vehicle
touch potential is practically the same as the rail-to-ground potential, especially if there is no other provision for grounding
the vehicle [7].
To properly address the subject of grounding, there should be
a clear understanding of the differences between equipment
grounding and system grounding. Equipment grounding
refers to grounding of the enclosures of the rectifier unit and
dc switchgear. System grounding refers to grounding of the
current-carrying conductor of the dc negative system. This
negative system is the negative of the rectifier unit at each TPSS
and the track running rails carrying negative return current.
The three basic configurations: 1) ungrounded; 2) impedance
grounded; and 3) effectively grounded that apply to ac power
systems [5] could very well apply to dc traction power systems.
Under normal system operation, there is no direct intentional
electrical connection between the dc negative and the ground.
However, this ungrounded system establishes reference to
ground through leakage resistance of the running rails. This
leakage resistance depends upon the track insulation material
and is generally on the order of 200 /1000 ft/rail under normal
dry weather conditions [5]. This value is subject to change
depending upon type of track construction, weather conditions,
and age of the tracks due to accumulation of metallic dust. Thus,
the ungrounded dc traction power system in reality is grounded
through an equivalent rail-to-ground leakage resistance
value derived by expression (1), assuming all four running rails
of the double-track system are cross bonded
(1)
where represents the sum of half the distances in miles between adjacent traction power substations.
These inherent characteristics of the dc traction power system
being grounded through its rail leakage resistance will establish
the return path for the positive-to-ground fault current.
III. EQUIPMENT GROUNDING
Design of the dc equipment enclosure grounding shall assure maximum safety of personnel and equipment under fault
conditions.
Early published literature [1], [2] indicates that danger to personnel results from high dc short-circuit currents due to associated fire, molten metal, and brilliant flash rather than electric
shock risk due to dc voltage present at the equipment enclosure
under fault conditions. At that time, grounding of one polarity of
the dc system was standard practice for the railway and mining
industries. As a result of these experiences, the development of
high-resistance equipment grounding protective relay schemes
became the norm of the transit industry in the U.S. These practices lead to the inclusion of the following in ANSI C37.20.1 [4]
Exception: LV switchgear having single polarity dc circuits, rated above 250 V, shall be ungrounded. It is rec-

Fig. 2. HRGM. 64M: Ground-fault monitoring relay; 64T: enclosure live fault
trip relay.

ommended that they be connected to ground only by protecting or indicating devices of relatively high resistance.
The National Electrical Code [6] Article 250110 (1) states
that the exposed noncurrent carrying metal parts of fixed equipment likely to become energized shall be grounded if within 8 ft
vertically or 5 ft horizontally from grounded surface and subject
to contact by persons.
It has been recognized by the transit industry that dc equipment enclosure rectifiers and metal-enclosed dc switchgear
should be grounded by using an appropriate protective relay
scheme for safety of personnel and equipment. This protection
relay scheme, which employs either high-resistance or low-resistance equipment grounding methods, has been a subject of
many debates and discussions among equipment suppliers,
design engineers, and transit authority representatives. Each
transit property employs one or the other grounding method
depending upon their own understanding of the safety and
design issues [3]. It should be mentioned that the tolerable
touch potential for a dc system is relatively higher, on the order
of 3.5 times, than an ac system [14].
A. High-Resistance Grounding Method (HRGM)
The equipment is completely insulated/isolated from all surrounding grounded structures by using insulated floor, insulated conduit bushings, and insulated substation walls facing
the equipment. A constant voltage on the order of 25-V dc is
applied between the enclosure and ground (see Fig. 2). This
voltage produces current high enough to energize relay 64M
but not relay 64T. Upon loss of this voltage or in case of enclosure-to-ground fault, relay 64M will deenergize to provide enclosure ground-fault alarm indication. In case of a dc-bus short
to the enclosure, the current will be high enough to energize
relay 64T to trip the substation ac and dc breakers to clear the
enclosure live fault condition. Shorting switch device 57 and
overvoltage relay device 59 are components of one of the system
grounding schemes that follow. It is worth mentioning that the
resistance value of the HRGM scheme will assure that during
equipment fault (arcing or bolted), the reasonable setting of device 59 will allow its activation to clear the enclosure live fault.

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Fig. 4. Solidly grounded system.

Fig. 3. LRGM. 74: Alarm relay; 64: enclosure live fault detection trip relay.

B. Low-Resistance Grounding Method (LRGM)

The equipment enclosure is kept insulated/isolated from all
surrounding grounded structures. The enclosure is grounded at a
single point by a low-resistance protection relay scheme (Fig. 3).
A low voltage on the order of 1-V dc is applied between the
enclosure and ground to monitor integrity of the low-resistance
grounding protection. Alarm relay device 74 will provide alarm
when this voltage is interrupted or there is enclosure ground
condition. During enclosure live fault condition, relay device
64 will energize to trip the substation ac and dc breakers due
to relatively higher magnitude of fault current when switch 57
closes upon energization of relay device 59. Transfer tripping of
the dc feeder breakers at adjacent substations is a must to clear
the fault on the load side of local dc feeder breakers. Without this
transfer tripping, major equipment damage has resulted with a
low-resistance equipment grounding scheme.
IV. DC POWER SYSTEM GROUNDING
Design of the dc power system grounding needs to compromise two contradictory requirements: 1) minimum dc stray current and 2) maximum personnel/equipment safety. To achieve
this objective, system grounding should be designed to satisfy
the following basic requirements.
1) Under normal system operation, the grounding system
should minimize dc stray current. This can be achieved by
keeping the system ungrounded, i.e., floating. No intentional connection is made between system negative and
ground.
2) Under abnormal system operation with unsafe
rail-to-ground potential, the system should be grounded
by shorting the negative polarity to ground to suppress
the unsafe voltage. The method of shorting the rail or the
substation negative bus box to ground shall be achieved
automatically through protection relays and shorting
devices in the shortest possible time. Upon clearing this
abnormal situation, the system will automatically return
to the original stage of an ungrounded power system.

Fig. 5.

Diode-grounded system.

Various methods employed to achieve the system grounding

schemes and their limitations are discussed.
A. Solidly Grounded System
The negative of each substation is grounded to the local
ground grid without any intentional impedance in the grounding
circuit Fig. 4. It should be recognized that the running rails
negative return circuit effectively becomes in parallel with the
ground and, thus, a considerable part of the negative return
current may seek the path of ground, increasing the threat of
corrosion to underground utilities in vicinity of the tracks.
Drainage bonds between underground utilities near the traction
power substation and electrical bonding of underground utilities in the vicinity of the tracks is mandatory to mitigate the
corrosion effect of dc currents. This method may exist only in
older transit systems. The modern systems do not employ such
a grounding system.
B. Diode-Grounded System
Paralleled array of diodes with a shorting dc contactor and
protection relays are employed at each traction power substation (Fig. 5). Upon detecting a set voltage level, relay device
59 energizes a dc contactor to automatically ground the negative system. Directional overcurrent relay device 32 opens the
shorting contactor for low-level forward currents and trips the
traction power system if high-level ground-fault current continues to flow. It should be noted that, under normal system
operation, for small magnitudes of voltage difference between
rail and ground, the diodes are always conductive, thus setting
a stage for relatively higher stray currents.

PAUL: DC TRACTION POWER SYSTEM GROUNDING

Fig. 6.

Fig. 7.

Automatic grounding switch.

Ungrounded system.

C. Automatic Grounding Switch

Shorting switch device 57, overvoltage relay device 59, and
overcurrent relay device 50 are employed at each traction power
substation (Fig. 6). Upon detecting a set voltage level, device 59
activates and closes the shorting switch to automatically ground
the negative system. Upon sensing short-circuit current, device
50 activates to deenergize the traction power substation. In addition, device 50 provides local indication and remote alarm to
manually reset the shorting switch. It should be mentioned that
a shorting switch is a mechanical device and takes definite time
to activate; dangerous voltage could occur during this time.
D. Ungrounded (Floating) System
The system is kept ungrounded under normal and abnormal
conditions (Fig. 7). This system provides the least stray current;
however, it may prove to be dangerous to the general public and
maintenance persons as the vehicle or running rails may be at
an elevated dc voltage with respect to ground, especially during
positive-to-ground fault. This method is not used in present
transit systems for safety reasons, especially under abnormal
fault conditions.
E. Thyristor-Grounding Method
The various protective relay devices of the thyristorgrounding scheme are shown in Fig. 8. Overvoltage relay
device 59 continuously checks the negative-to-ground voltage.
When this voltage exceeds a preset value, the relay triggers
the thyristor gate [gate-turn-off thyristor (GTO)] by auxiliary

821

Fig. 8. Thyristor grounding system.

relay device 59X to ground the negative system. This limits

the potentially dangerous rail-to-ground voltage by allowing
current to return to the source. The contacts of instantaneous
current relay device 50 energize time delay auxiliary relays
50X1 and 50X2. After a short delay upon sensing decrease in
the current, device 50X1 provides an alarm as well as provides
gate-turn-off signal to the thyristor to resume its normal
position of an ungrounded system. However, if the current
continues to flow in case of positive-to-ground fault, then after
a preset time delay device 50X2 will trip all dc feeder breakers.
The setting of relay device 59 may be set on the order of 60
V, which is considered safe touch potential. This will allow
the system to operate ungrounded for normal conditions until
ground-to-negative rail potential rises to the set limit of 60 V
under abnormal positive feeder-to-ground fault condition.
The dc feeder breakers will automatically close through the
load-measuring protective relay scheme except for the faulted
feeder circuit breaker and, thus, provides a positive indication
of the faulted circuit.
It should be mentioned that a bidirectional GTO unit may be
required, depending upon the system configuration and excessive train starting currents resulting in dangerous rail voltage
rise above ground. Such a design if implemented should have
GTO activation counters, and a voltage and current monitoring
device scheme to optimize the settings of device 59 to assure
maximum safety and minimum stray current injection.
The advantage of the bidirectional thyristor scheme over the
grounding diode scheme is that the thyristor unit will ground the
system only when the set dangerous voltage occurs due to either
train bunching load currents or due to positive-to-ground faults
that develop. Under normal system operation below the set negative-to-ground overvoltage, the system is kept ungrounded and,
thus, stray leakage current is minimum.
V. DC EQUIPMENT ENCLOSURE FAULT
Bridging of the dc bus to the enclosure may lead to bolted
fault or arcing fault inside the dc enclosure. Depending upon the
condition of the power system being ungrounded or grounded,
fault current will be controlled by the various resistance parameters defined below.
Running rails leakage resistance. This can be computed by using expression (1).

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 38, NO. 3, MAY/JUNE 2002

Substation ground grid resistance. This value can be

on the order of 5 or less by proper design of TPSS
ground grid.
Equipment grounding protection scheme resistance.
System nominal dc voltage.

TABLE I
HIGH-RESISTANCE AND LOW-RESISTANCE EQUIPMENT GROUNDING METHODS

A. Ungrounded Power System

and arcing fault curSteady-state dc bolted fault current
inside the dc equipment enclosure may be computed
rent
by using the following expressions when the power system is
ungrounded:
(2)
(3)

B. Grounded Power System

When any of the system grounding protection schemes
grounds the negative rail, then the value of rail-to-ground
resistance as well as the local ground grid resistance in expressions (2) and (3) will become zeros, thus increasing the fault
current values. The fault current expressions for the grounded
system (grounding points of equipment ground circuit and the
grounding point of the negative rail or bus connected to same
ground grid) will be as follows:
(4)
(5)
Expressions (2)(5) are for comparing grounding configurations only and not for computing accurate dc short-circuit current. It should be noted that the enclosure touch voltage in case
of arcing or bolted fault between the positive dc bus and the
enclosure is practically the voltage drop across the equipment
grounding protection scheme resistance value. Thus, the touch
potential in the case of the low-resistance equipment grounding
method will be lower than the touch potential in the case of the
HRGM. However, the corresponding short-circuit current in the
case of the low-resistance method will be considerably higher
than the corresponding value in the case of the high-resistance
method.
It is important that the settings of relay device 59 associated
with the system grounding protection relays be such that device 59 activates to make the ungrounded system as a grounded
system to clear enclosure live fault condition as required.
The calculated values of bolted and arcing fault currents
shown in Table I are based upon system voltage of 750 V and
ground grid resistance of 5 both for the grounded system and
ungrounded system. Voltage drop across the arc is assumed to
be 200 V as shown in expressions (3) and (5).
Table I indicates that short-circuit current values in the case
of the HRGM as compared to the corresponding short-circuit
values in the case of the low-resistance method have very
little effect by the change from an ungrounded to a grounded
system. Using the short-circuit values listed in Table I, it can be
concluded that the potential rise of local substation ground in

* Indicates values associated with double track lengths of 5 miles with leakage
resistance of 200
/1000 ft/rail, ungrounded system.

** Indicates corresponding values for track length of 10 miles, ungrounded

system.
*** Values for the grounded system, when grounded by any of the system
grounding methods connecting negative rail to ground by voltage-sensing
relay device 59.

the case of the HRGM is small compared to the low-resistance

method. This may not be detected by system grounding relay
device 59.

VI. FAULTS OUTSIDE THE DC ENCLOSURE

There is a possibility of two types of faults outside the dc
enclosure on the electrified tracks. These faults are arcing fault
(positive to ground) and bolted short-circuit fault (positiveto- negative). The arcing fault will generally involve high
impedance at the fault location, whereas the bolted fault will
have no intentional fault impedance at the fault location.
Both types of fault currents will be controlled by the system
grounding resistance parameters and/or rail-to-ground leakage
resistance, irrespective of the type of equipment grounding
method.
If positive touches ground away from the traction power substation, it will lead to a high-impedance fault with low current
magnitude. However, the ground potential will be elevated with
respect to the rail with the possibility of activating relay device
59 as shown in system grounding methods. This, in turn, will trip
the substation feeder breakers to clear the fault condition. Unless
the negative is shorted to ground by an appropriate protection
relay scheme, fault current is controlled by the rail-to-ground
leakage resistance and the fault impedance. In many situations,
this fault current will be so low that the dc feeder breaker protective relays may not be able to detect and clear the fault condition
in an appropriate time.

PAUL: DC TRACTION POWER SYSTEM GROUNDING

TABLE II
SYSTEM GROUNDING VERSUS TOUCH POTENTIAL AND STRAY CURRENT

823

difference between the rail and ground, and automatically return to the normal state of an ungrounded rail when dangerous
voltage is suppressed.
IX. CONCLUSIONS

VII. DC STRAY CURRENT

The fraction of the dc load current returning to the traction
power substation via negative rails leaks to ground due to
leakage resistance of the insulation pads between running
rails and ground. To minimize dc stray current, voltage drop
across the negative return rails is kept as low as practical
and the traction power system negative is kept ungrounded
under normal system operation. The relative magnitude of
the stray current and the vehicle touch potential for various
system grounding configurations is shown in Table II. Both
the stray current and the human safety seem to be balanced by
the thyristor-grounding method as compared to other system
grounding methods.
The protective relays shown in Fig. 8 provide complete
tripping and isolation of the traction power system in case
of heavy short-circuit current due to positive-to-ground fault,
and automatically return to normal configuration once the
fault is cleared. Reverse GTO may be used at the stations to
suppress dangerous vehicle touch potential; however, it may
unnecessarily increase stray current magnitude.
VIII. SAFETY ANALYSIS
The arc associated with dc current has proven to be very
dangerous to personnel and equipment. Thus, the equipment
grounding and system grounding protection schemes should be
optimized to minimize dc fault current if possible. The design
should also assure that a person in contact with the faulted dc
equipment enclosure or the transit vehicle is not exposed to the
danger of electric shock. DC voltage in the range of 6090 V
is considered safe [7], [14] according to the present transit industry practice. Based upon the present trends of more litigation
from such causes as electric shocks and from the nature of some
humans with pacemakers or metallic components embedded in
human bones by advances in the medical field, it appears that
the safe dc voltage may very well be lower than 60 V.
To reduce the effect of electric shock to passengers, the station platform edges should employ high-resistance rubber mats.
Similarly, inside the traction power substation, insulated floors
with very high volume resistivity compound tend to increase the
operator safety from electric shock.
From the safety point of view, running rails should be
grounded, however, from the stray current point of view, they
should be kept isolated from ground. To compromise this
requirement, the system grounding protective relay scheme
should ground the rail upon sensing the dangerous voltage

1) Generic protection schemes of high-resistance and

low-resistance equipment grounding methods were presented. With the application of modern microprocessor
and digital relays, individual vendors offer their own
brand names for these grounding protection schemes.
There is no industry standard for the resistance values
used in the low- or high-resistance protective relay
schemes. Some suppliers may promote their low-resistance protective relay scheme without establishing its
short-circuit current withstand capability. This could
prove to be destructive and dangerous in the case of
heavy short-circuit current established by the system
grounding protection scheme. Both the protective relay
scheme as well as the shorting device should be capable
of withstanding the worst case maximum expected dc
short-circuit currents.
2) Both the high-resistance and the low-resistance equipment grounding protective relay schemes in combination
with the preferred GTO system grounding protection
scheme should be evaluated. The evaluation should be
based upon the short-circuit and rail-to-ground potential
rise calculations. The results should be reviewed with the
equipment supplier.
3) The substation spacing should be established by performing rail-to-ground potential rise and stray current
analysis under normal and abnormal system operation.
For system grounding purposes, a bidirectional GTO unit
may be needed, depending upon the system parameters
and configuration.
4) When the passenger stations are physically separated
from the traction power substations, a system grounding
protection scheme with reverse GTO similar to one used
at the traction power substation may be employed at the
passenger station. This may increase the personnel safety
from the high vehicle touch potential under rare cases of
simultaneous train starting or train bunching conditions.
5) The application engineer should carefully evaluate the
suppliers equipment and system grounding protective
relay schemes. Evaluation should include the overall
reliability and factory tests of microprocessor solid-state
products to assure that their performance is guaranteed.
X. RECOMMENDATION
1) For safe design practices of a dc traction power system,
there is a need for the industry standard for clarification of
high- and low-resistance grounding protection methods
with recommended resistance values. The standard
should review and establish the safe touch dc potential
for the general public and the substation maintenance
person, especially now when pacemakers and metallic
bones have become an integral part of the human body.

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS, VOL. 38, NO. 3, MAY/JUNE 2002

2) It is recommended that the low-voltage switchgear

committee responsible for upgrading ANSI C37.20.1 [4]
should review the outdated exception, LV switchgear
having single polarity dc circuits, rated above 250 V,
should be ungrounded. It is recommended that they be
connected to the ground only by protecting or indicating
devices of relatively high resistance. This seems to be
invalid, as the majority of the modern transit systems
are operated ungrounded under normal system operation
compared to the grounded systems of the past.

[10] J. C. Das and R. H. Osman, Grounding of AC and DC low-voltage and

medium-voltage drive systems, IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat., vol. 34, pp.
205216, Jan./Feb. 1998.
[11] IEEE Standard for Low-Voltage DC Power Circuit Breakers Used in
Enclosures, ANSI/IEEE Standard C37.14-1999.
[12] A corrosion control manual for rail rapid transit, U.S. Department of
Transportation, Washington, DC, Rep. by NASA Design Engineering
Directorate/SRI International/NASA, 1982.
[13] C. F. Dalziel and W. R. Lee, Reevaluation of lethal electric current,
IEEE Trans. Ind. Gen. Applicat., vol. IGA-4, pp. 467476, Sept./Oct.
1968.
[14] IEEE Guide for Safety in AC Substation Grounding, ANSI/IEEE Std.
80, 2000.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The author would like to thank R. Belardo of Earth Tech for
his technical review during the preparation of this paper.
REFERENCES
[1] IEEE recommended practices for grounding single polarity DC structures , AIEE, Committee Rep., p. 784790, Oct. 1957.
[2] D. C. Hoffman, Grounding of DC structures and enclosures, presented
at the AIEE Winter General Meeting, New York, 1961.
[3] P. Forquer, Equipment grounding in traction power substations, presented at the APTA Annu. Conf., Miami, FL, 1993, Paper 67-R93.
[4] IEEE Standard for Metal-Enclosed Low-Voltage Power Circuit Breaker
Switchgear, ANSI/IEEE Std. C37.20.1.
[5] IEEE Recommended Practices for Grounding of Industrial and Commercial Power Systems, IEEE Std. 142-1991.
[6] National Electrical Code, National Fire Protection Assoc., Quincy, MA,
1999.
[7] D. Paul, Operational safety and maintenance considerations for people
movers DC grounding systems, presented at the APTA Annu. Conf.,
Buffalo, NY, 1988, Paper 175-R88.
[8] K. J. Moody, Stray current characteristics of grounded, ungrounded,
and diode grounded DC transit systems, presented at the CORROSION/94, Baltimore, MD, Mar. 1994.
[9] J. S. Morton, Circuit breaker and protection requirements for DC
switchgear used in rapid transit systems, IEEE Trans. Ind. Applicat.,
vol. IA-21, pp. 12681273, Sept./Oct. 1985.

Dev Paul (M73SM90) received the B.Sc. degree

with honors in mathematics and the B.E. (Honors)
and M.S.E.E. degrees in electrical engineering from
Punjab University, Chandigarh, India, in 1965, 1969,
and 1971, respectively. He completed further studies
in power systems at the University of Santa Clara,
Santa Clara, CA, in 1975.
In 1972, he joined Kaiser Engineers (now Earth
Tech), Oakland, CA, as a Design Engineer. He has
worked on a variety of heavy industrial, cogeneration, commercial, DOD, and DOE facilities, and
rapid transit rail projects. In his present position as a Senior Professional
XI, he is responsible for the overall design, analysis, studies, specifications,
installation, project management, system startup, and system integration work
on rapid transit systems. He has authored several papers published in the IEEE
TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRY APPLICATIONS and American Public Transit
Association conference proceedings. His main fields of interests are power
system analysis, protection, grounding, and harmonics.
Mr. Paul is an active member of several committees of the IEEE Industry
Applications Society. He has served as a Treasurer and Vice Chairman for the
local IEEE Chapter. He received the Award of Distinction for his M.S.E.E. thesis
work on power system stability. He is a Registered Professional Engineer in the
States of California, Nevada, and Oregon.