116
1, JANUARY 2007
Differential Protection Based on Zero-Sequence
Voltages for Generator Stator Ground Fault
Tai Nengling and Juergen Stenzel
AbstractThis paper introduces a new differential protection
1
scheme based on zero-sequence voltages with 100% coverage for
1
generator stator ground faults. Analysis shows that the -fun-
damental zero-sequence voltages and the -third-harmonic
voltages at the generator neutral and the terminals will change
simultaneously, and they present some similar characteristics.
According to that, the new scheme that exploits the fault informa-
tion of both the zero-sequence fundamental voltage and the third-
harmonic voltage is described. As it combines the information of
the zero-sequence fundamental voltage and the third-harmonic
voltage, the scheme can detect the ground fault with high sensi-
tivity in 100% coverage winding. Simulation and field test results
show that the proposed scheme can obtain higher sensitivity than
the traditional schemes.
Index TermsFault contribution component, stator ground
protection, third-harmonic voltage, zero-sequence fundamental
voltage.
I. INTRODUCTION
G REAT attention is paid to the stator ground fault, because
it is one of the most common faults a generator will suffer
and it can also cause a big hazard. With the development of
the electric power industry, the capacity of a single generator
becomes larger and larger, which give many challenges to the
design, manufacturing, and operation of the generator.1
For example, higher sensitivity is usually needed for the stator
ground fault protection scheme of the huge generator. However,
the key problem that still affects the protection device is how
to keep high sensitivity under different operation conditions. In
particular, for a huge hydrogenerator, since the capacitance of
the stator winding is large, the protection schemes will suffer
low sensitivity. At the same time, the entire stator winding must
be covered when designing a protection scheme against ground
faults.
Many stator ground fault protection schemes have been pro-
posed and used in practice [1][6]. The simple and widely used
methods are based on measuring the zero-sequence voltage.
Generally, they comprise two parts: the zero-sequence funda-
mental voltage and the third-harmonic voltage scheme. When
properly set, a zero-sequence fundamental voltage scheme
can provide protection for 90% to 95% of the generator stator
Manuscript received December 22, 2005; revised April 15, 2006. Paper no.
TPWRD-00743-2005.
T. Nengling is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao
Tong University, Shanghai 200030, China.
J. Stenzel is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Darmstadt Uni-
versity of Technology, Darmstadt 64283, Germany.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRD.2006.887099
1Sponsored by the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Con-
tract Number 50577042.
0885-8977/$20.00 2006 IEEE
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 22, NO.
winding. But it cannot detect the ground fault near the generator
neutral, which is usually protected by a third-harmonic voltage
scheme. The protection schemes, which only use the third-har-
monic voltages at the neutral or terminals , have
low sensitivities because they vary within a wide range with the
change of the operation condition. So schemes based on the com-
parison of the relative change of or have been suggested
and used [1][4], [7], [8]. In practice, they suffer the disadvan-
tage of low sensitivity because the generator operation situation
often changes. To overcome this disadvantage, adaptive schemes
are suggested in [2] and [5]. But for a huge hydrogenerator,
which has a large stator winding capacitance, those methods still
present low sensitivity. Reference [9] proposes a new scheme
with higher sensitivity, which uses the wavelet transform as a
new tool for third-harmonic voltage processing. Yet it needs to
be tested and verified before it is widely used in practice.
It is important to indicate that all of those protection schemes
exploit only the fault information of either the zero-sequence
fundamental voltage or third-harmonic voltage. In case of high
resistance faults, the change of the fault voltages at the gener-
ator neutral and terminals is so small in comparison with pre-
fault voltages that the conventional schemes are insensitive. This
paper proposes a new scheme with high sensitivity to detect the
ground fault in the complete generator stator winding, which is
termed differential protection relaying based on zero-sequence
voltages. The relay requires a memory function to retain a pre-
fault reference signal and is therefore easily realized in hardware
by a microcomputer.
II. COMPARISON OF PROTECTION SCHEMES BASED
ON ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGES
Protection coverage with a critical resistance (PCCR) curve
proposed in [5] is used to describe the characteristic of the stator
ground-fault protection schemes. That is, the sensitivity of a pro-
tection scheme is determined by the critical resistance, which is
combined with the fault location.
A. Sensitivity of the Zero-Sequence Fundamental Voltage
Protection Scheme
The application of a ground fault protection scheme, espe-
cially a 100% coverage scheme, is dependent on the way by
which the generator neutral is grounded and on the generator
terminal connections [5], [7], [8]. There are three grounding
methods in China: 1) the distribution transformer grounded
with a resistance loaded at the secondary part; 2) the neutral re-
actor grounded method; and 3) the ungrounded method, which
is named as grounding methods I, II, and III, respectively. The
simulation results show that the fundamental voltage caused by
the ground fault is almost identical through the whole windings.
NENGLING AND STENZEL: PROTECTION BASED ON ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGES 117

Fig. 2. PCCR curve of scheme 1.

Fig. 1. PCCR curves of the zero-sequence fundamental voltage protection

scheme under different grounding methods.

So the overvoltage relay could be installed in the neutral or

at the terminals of the machine. Generally, the overvoltage
relay setting is chosen between 510 V. Fig. 1 presents the
protection coveragecritical resistance (PCCR) curve for the
setting voltage of 5 V [5]. Curves 1, 2, and 3 are, respectively,
the PCCR analysis of grounding methods I, II, and III. The Fig. 3. PCCR curves of scheme 2. (1 is  = 0:06; 2 :  = 0:045).
generator, which is termed as generator I in this paper, has
40 poles, 5 branches per phase, and 36 coils in a branch. The
winding capacitance to ground per phase is F, the where is an adjustable and constant complex ratio coefficient
inductance and the resistance of a turn is and and is the setting value.
, the grounding resistance of the generator (in- Scheme 2: operate, if
cluding the grounding transformer) is referred to the generator
side . And the grounding method II is a (2)
neutral reactor grounded with .
where is the calculation cycle, which is normally chosen as
Suppose is the ratio between the number of turns from the
the 2-3 fundamental cycle and is the setting value.
neutral to the fault point and the total number of turns in series for
Scheme 1 is based on the ratio of and . Unfortunately,
one phase. Fig. 1 shows that the protection sensitivity character-
the ratio of and does not remain constant even when the
istics are almost linear, increasing with the distance of the fault
generators operate under unfaulty conditions [3][5]. Therefore,
point from the neutral . The maximum sensitivity lies
the trip margin of scheme 1 should be determined based on the
at the terminals . Curve 1 shows that the relay will pro-
maximum value considering both the varying and the normal
vide the protection for 40% coverage of the stator winding with
conditions. is a constant and adjusted to a suitable value be-
3-k fault resistance, and 6% near the terminals with 8 k . Ob-
fore the relay is put into operation. Its PCCR curve is shown in
viously, this relay will not detect ground faults occurring near the
Fig. 2 with . It should be pointed out that the sen-
neutral. That task will be performed by the second relay respon-
sitivity of the scheme is not satisfied because different normal
sible for the changes of zero-sequence third-harmonic voltages.
conditions have to be considered for the reliability.
According to Fig. 1, curves 2 and 3 always present higher sensi-
The difference between the above two schemes is that we sub-
tivity than curve 1. It is clear that the grounding method will affect
stitute in scheme 2 for in scheme
the protection performance. As the grounding method I is widely
1. It has the adaptive ability to catch the changing ratio of
used in China, it is considered in this paper as an example.
and [5]. The PCCR curve of the scheme 2 is shown as curve
1 in Fig. 3, with . It can be seen that its protection
B. Sensitivity of Third-Harmonic Voltage Protection Schemes
zone can cover the whole stator winding, but scheme 2 presents
Generally the third-harmonic voltage schemes for stator higher sensitivity than scheme 1. It is reasonable considering the
ground fault are based on the comparison of the relative change following conditions:
of or . The widely used methods in practice can be 1) Although the ratio between and of a generator
divided into some basic forms as below: changes with the field excitation and the output power, the
Scheme 1: operate, if rate of that changing during normal operation or a power
swing will be much smaller than in the case of a ground
(1) fault.
118 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 22, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007

2) In contrast to scheme 1, scheme 2 need not increase the

threshold to avoid maloperation during normal operation
or a power swing. Thus, it can ensure higher sensitivity
under different conditions.
3) The setting value of scheme 2 can be considered to be
approximately dependent upon the calculation error of
(2). This allows the selection of very small setting values
without maloperation. Given more effective data [5], the
calculation error will be reduced, and the sensitivity can Fig. 4. Equivalent circuits of a generator under different conditions. (a) Equiv-
alent circuit of faulted generator with only fault contribution voltage. (b) Un-
be improved by choosing a lower value of . Curve 2 in faulted equivalent circuit.
Fig. 3 shows that the adaptive scheme can retain higher
sensitivity with for generator I. However, it
is not enough for some large generators. For example, TABLE I
MEASURED VALUES OF THE THIRD HARMONIC VOLTAGE
the demanded critical resistance at the neutral for the PHASOR INCREMENTS OF GENERATOR II
large generators in the Three Gorges Power Station is
8 k . Obviously, it is found that even the adaptive scheme
cannot match it.
The main reason for a limited sensitivity of the above
schemes is that in case of high resistance faults, the changing
of the voltages at the terminals and at the neutral of a generator
is small. This small change could not produce a sufficient
operating quantity. From Figs. 13, one can see that the
zero-sequence fundamental voltage scheme and third-harmonic
voltage scheme have a sensitivity compensatory zone. Com-
pared to the third-harmonic voltage schemes, the zero-sequence
For a faulted generator, as the symmetry is destroyed, the
fundamental voltage scheme shows higher sensitivity between
zero-sequence fundamental voltage will appear as soon as a
the middle zone and the generator terminals. At the same time,
stator ground fault occurs (not including the point at the neu-
the third-harmonic voltage schemes present better performance
tral). Based on the same reason, the zero-sequence fundamental
near the generator neutral, in which the zero-sequence funda-
voltage caused by the ground fault is then identical through the
mental voltage scheme is not satisfied. According to that, if one
whole windings. The phasors of the zero-sequence fundamental
can utilize both information of the zero-sequence fundamental
voltage at terminals and the neutral are expressed as and ,
voltage and the third-harmonic voltage in a new scheme, it will
respectively. There is
obtain satisfied sensitivity and protect the entire stator winding
independently.
(3)
III. ANALYSIS OF FAULT-CONTRIBUTED
ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGE Therefore, , where
. That is, the incremental values of the zero-se-
The fault contributed zero-sequence voltages (termed as quence voltage both at the neutral and the terminals are equiv-
-zero sequence voltage) consist of the zero-sequence fun- alent. This information is contained in the signal measured by
damental voltage and the third-harmonic voltage. The third- the protection relay and, as a result, it can be used to determine
harmonic voltages at the generator neutral and the terminals whether a stator ground fault occurred in a generator.
will vary simultaneously when a ground fault occurs in the According to that, the main part of the relay in this paper is
generator stator, even if it is grounded with high resistance. the multichannel filter working as a bandpass filter. The relay
The resistances of the generator winding have an insignificant effectively extracts the mixing values of zero-sequence funda-
influence on the zero-sequence voltage, and can be neglected mental voltage and the third-harmonic voltage generated by the
[9]. Based on that, when a ground fault occurs, phasor quan- stator ground fault. In order to essentially form the -zero se-
tity increments of the third-harmonic voltage at the terminals quence voltage, the multichannel filters are designed to produce
and the neutral of a generator are equivalent two signal outputs. Algorithms are then specially programmed
as shown in Fig. 4(a), [5]. In Fig. 4, and are the equiv- to extract the -zero sequence voltage from the filters.
alent impedances of the neutral and the terminals, is the
fault-contributed voltage at the fault point, and R indicates the
IV. DIFFERENTIAL PROTECTION SCHEME BASED ON
fault resistance. Table I presents the experimental results of
FAULT-CONTRIBUTED ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGES
a model generator (termed as generator II) at different fault
locations under the half load. The generator has the following The principle of differential protective relaying in this paper
characteristics: is to use only those zero-sequence voltage increments due to
rated power: 15 kVA with a power factor of 0.8; the fact that there exists a stator ground fault. According to
rated output voltage: 115 V; Section III, it is important to realize that the incremental value
rated excitation current: 1.55 A. of the zero-sequence voltage at the generator neutral and
NENGLING AND STENZEL: PROTECTION BASED ON ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGES 119

Fig. 5. Block diagram of typical relay hardware.

the terminals are equivalent. Then, the corresponding dif- it considers only the fault contribution voltage by cancellation
ferential protection scheme based on the zero-sequence voltages of the prefault voltages, the new scheme can obtain higher sen-
is sitivity, restricted by only the used protective equipment.

Operate if (4) V. REALIZATION AND TEST RESULTS

According to the above, the new protection relay with the pro-
where posed scheme (termed as scheme 3) was developed. To illus-
trate the efficiency of the new protection principle, it has been
(5)
tested in different situations compared with scheme 1 and 2. The
(6) protection relay was coupled to a commercial sequential-events
recorder and installed in a model generator.
and is the sample point and is the calculation cycle.
For improving the reliability, (4) should be calculated m times A. Relay Hardware
repeatedly.
The relay hardware is a multiprocessor system com-
Equation (4) can also be
prising a master controller and one or more microprocessors
(TMS320F206), and the sampling rate is 4800 Hz/s. One
(7)
type of typical relay hardware is shown in Fig. 5. The digital
where signal processor (DSP) card has been designed according to
the low-cost principle but provides sufficient computing ability
[10]. A watchdog has been fitted to the master microprocessor
to check its operation. Outputs from relaying functions are
automatically disconnected when the watchdog fails to provide
The scheme considers only fault contribution voltages by can- the appropriate normal signal.
cellation of the prefault voltages. On normal conditions, the The protection prototype contains:
waveforms of the zero-sequence voltage under normal or power DSP TMS320F206, 1-Mb random-access memory
swings will present a continuous waveform. In this case, no (RAM), a 1-Mb FLASH RAM for fault recording, and
or can be detected and the startup scheme will not send 16-kB EEPROM for storing set values;
any alarm. On the other hand, the waveforms of and are voltage or current measuring circuits depending on the field
able to present irregularities when a big, sudden change occurs requirements;
in the field excitation current. At this time, or may ap- input/output circuit comprising display, relay output sig-
pear. But it will not affect the performance of the new scheme. nals, etc.
Since and are inverse on this condition as shown dual-port static SRAM (CY7C136) for port-to-port com-
in Fig. 4(b) and [5], in which is the third-harmonic voltage munication between DSP and MP80C51. Two ports are
source on the normal condition, the phase angle between provided to permit independent access to any location in
and is approximately , and their amplitude values memory. It is the solution to applications requiring shared
are usually different. At the same time, there is theoretically or buffered data in multiprocessor design;
no zero-sequence fundamental voltage because of the generator communication and managing system: a microprocessor
symmetry. So a great restraint quantity exists, which can ensure 80C51 (MP80C51) for local user interface, liquid-crystal
the protection avoiding maloperation on normal conditions. As display (LCD), communication unit, and so on
120
).
Fig. 6. Schematic diagram of the generator model.
)
The device receives all of the signals both in normal oper-
ation and disturbances, stores all of the incoming information
such as settings, currents and voltages, recorded events and dis-
turbances, and can print out the information or display them on
an LCD. This system can also be linked up to the supervisory
station control system via communication such as fiber-optic
links. The protection functions always operate autonomously,
or independently of the communication and managing system.
Any abnormality occurring in the communication and managing
system will not disturb the protection function operation. Thus,
the operation and performance of the proposed scheme are de-
termined only by the related hardware and software.
Since the new scheme is based on differential principle and
since it has few variables, the setting operation had been made
as simple as possible. The connection of the protection device
is shown in Fig. 6. The generator is grounded through a dis-
tribution transformer T1 with a resistance-loaded secondary. It
should be indicated that scheme 1 and 2 are also verified in the
generator for the performance comparison.
B. Test Results
Many laboratory tests were conducted to validate the new
scheme before the prototype is developed. Limited by the de-
sign, manufacturing, and operation conditions, there exists no
perfect symmetry generator in fact. On the other hand, for a cer-
tain unfaulted generator, does not remain constant because
of the change of excitation current and output power of the gen-
erator. But it will not affect the performance of the new scheme,
because it can be removed easily by the software as listed in (5)
and (6). So it cannot influence the reliability of the new scheme.
Experimental results under various situations show that the pro-
posed method can keep high sensitivity without maloperation
during all operation conditions.
It is important to indicate that oversensitivity could cause
problems such as the maloperations. To overcome this disad-
vantage, some measures should be applied. First, for improving
the reliability, the scheme should be evaluated at least 6 times
in one cycle repeatedly, and only if above 4 times satisfied, the
fault trip signal can be sent out. Secondly, the startup signal is
very important for the fault initiation. At last, a good hardware
and software design can ensure high reliability of the scheme.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 22, NO. 1, JANUARY 2007
Fig. 7. Waveforms of zero-sequence voltages at terminals and neutral ( =
25%; R = 800
Fig. 8. Waveforms of zero-sequence voltages at terminals and neutral with the
fault located at the neutral (R = 10 k
TABLE II
MAXIMUM PROTECTION RESISTANCE OF DIFFERENT SCHEMES
The protection relay was also evaluated according to the field
condition, by changing the capacitance to model generator I, a
large generator (700 MW) in Three-Gorges Hydropower Sta-
tion. It has operated flawlessly on various conditions. Test re-
sults showed that all of the schemes presented good perfor-
mance. But the proposed method (scheme 3) keeps higher sen-
sitivity without maloperation during all operating conditions.
Fig. 7 is the waveform of the zero-sequence voltages at terminals
and neutral with the fault located at % and .
On this condition, all of the schemes detected it. Fig. 8 shows the
waveforms of the zero-sequence voltages at terminals and neu-
tral with the fault located at the neutral and . It can
be seen that in Fig. 8 there is only a third-harmonic component,
while in Fig. 7, there is both the zero-sequence fundamental
voltage and the third-harmonic voltage. And the fault voltages in
Fig. 8 change so slightly that they almost cannot be recognized.
This is reasonable because the ground fault is located at the neu-
tral with high resistance. At the same time, the fault component
of the zero-sequence voltages at the terminals and the neutral
when the fault is grounded with 10-k resistance are certainly
smaller than it is grounded with 800- resistance. At this time,
schemes 1 and 2 cannot find the fault, but the recording results
indicated that the new scheme operated correctly. Table II shows
sensitivity comparison of the different schemes. It is important
to point out that some faults were grounded with high resis-
tances, which were not detected by schemes 1 and 2, and only
scheme 3 caught it. This situation was anticipated and it indi-
cated that the new scheme had higher sensitivity and reliability.
NENGLING AND STENZEL: PROTECTION BASED ON ZERO-SEQUENCE VOLTAGES
VI. CONCLUSION
Analysis results show that the protection schemes use only the
fundamental frequency voltage, or the third-harmonic voltage
is not satisfied in some special zones of the generator winding.
But they have the sensitivity compensatory zone. According to
this, this paper introduces a new scheme, which uses both in-
formation of the fundamental voltage and the third-harmonic
voltage. As the -fundamental zero-sequence voltages and the
-third-harmonic voltages at the generator neutral and the ter-
minals will change simultaneously, and they present some sim-
ilar characteristics on fault conditions, it can be used to deter-
mine whether a stator ground fault has occurred in a generator.
Based on the above, the new generator stator ground fault
protection scheme is developed and the practical implementa-
tion of the protection equipment is also demonstrated, including
the relay hardware and software designing. As information
of the zero-sequence fundamental voltage and third-harmonic
voltage is used simultaneously, the scheme can receive higher
sensitivity. Test results show that the proposed approach is
successful in detecting the generator stator ground fault. It
could have higher sensitivity than other schemes.
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Tai Nengling received the B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D.
degrees in electric engineering from Huazhong Uni-
versity of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan,
China, in 1994, 1997, and 2000, respectively.
Currently, he is an Associate Professor with
Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.
Jrgen Stenzel was born in 1944. He received the
Dipl.-Ing. degree from Munich University of Tech-
nology, Munich, Germany, in 1970, and the Dr.-Ing.
degree from the University of Siegen, Siegen, Ger-
many, in 1984.
Currently, he is with the Darmstadt University of
Technology, Darmstadt, Germany, where he received
a full professorship in the Department of Electrical
Engineering and Information Technology.
Dr. Stenzel is a member of the Electrical Power
System Laboratory, Darmstadt. His area of interest is
power system analysis and control.