3/16/2014 Electrical Systems: Substation Bus Schemes

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Friends,Here I am committed to make the
materials as simple as possible. I promise
you to minimize the use of school maths so Substation Bus Schemes
that both Technocrats and students will
benefit from the articles. Here the main aim
is to develop clear concept.
Introduction:

We already mentioned the different types of substations. Before more in-depth discussion about each type of
substation it is better to know few common essential features of a substation. Here we discuss about the bus
Search schemes commonly implemented in an electrical substation. The Bus scheme is the arrangement of overhead
bus bar and associated switching equipments in a substation. The operational flexibility and reliability of the
substation greatly depends upon the bus scheme.
archive

► 2012 (8) Here I reiterate that the electric substation is a junction point where usually more than two transmission lines
terminate. Actually in most of EHV and HV substations more than half a dozen of lines terminate. In many large
▼ 2011 (17)
transmission substations the total numbers of lines terminating exceeds one or two dozens. In this scenario
► December (1)
obviously the first requirement is avoidance of total shutdown of the substation for the purpose of
► November (1) maintenance of some equipment(s) or due to fault somewhere. Total shutdown of substation means complete
shutdown of all the lines connected to this particular substation. So the switching scheme is adopted
► October (1)
depending upon the importance of the substation, reliability requirement, flexibility and future expansion etc..
▼ September (1) Of course substation construction and operational cost is also to be considered. Clearly a EHV or UHV
Substation Bus transmission substation where large numbers of important lines terminate is extremely important and the
Schemes substation should be designed to avoid total failure and interruption of minimum numbers of circuits.

► August (1)
There are mainly six bus schemes. these are:
► July (1)
Single Bus
► June (2) Main Bus and Transfer Bus

► May (1) Double Bus Double Breaker

Double Bus Single Breaker
► April (3) Ring Bus
► March (2) Breaker and Half

► February (2) Before we proceed further I would like to discuss in brief about the Circuit Breaker and Isolator. It will be
helpful for novices. See the figure below where two buses are connected by circuit breakers and isolators as
► January (1)
shown. A circuit breaker is a device whose main purpose is to break the circuit carrying load current or fault
► 2010 (15) current. As the breaker is opened then current is interrupted in the circuit. But it is not safe to work with
opened breaker as one or both sides of the breaker terminals may be still energised. The breaker is then
isolated from the rest of the circuit by opening the isolators on both sides of breaker. The isolators are used to
followers
isolate the breaker or circuit. It should be remembered that the isolators are never opened or closed to
interrupt or make the circuit. That means when the circuit is to be made on, first the isolators on both sides of a
breaker are closed then breaker is closed to allow current flow. When the circuit is to be made off or
interrupted, first the breaker is opened(tripped), hence load current is interrupted. Then to isolate the breaker,
isolators are opened. Isolators are designed to interrupt small current. Breakers are designed to interrupt
large load current and heavy fault current. Both breaker and isolator carry load current in normal state.

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3/16/2014 Electrical Systems: Substation Bus Schemes

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Single Bus
(NEW) Appointment gadget >>
As the name indicate the substation with this configuration has a single bus (Fig-B). All the circuits are
connected to this bus. A fault on the bus or between the bus and a breaker results in the outage of the entire
bus or substation. Failure of any breaker also results in outage of the entire bus. Maintenance of any circuit
Siemens Low breaker requires shutdown of the corresponding circuit/line and maintenance of bus requires complete

Voltage shutdown of the bus. A bypass switch across the breaker should be used for maintenance of the corresponding
breaker. This case the protection system is disabled.
lel.hk/en/index.html
Official Siemens Hong
Single Bus configuration is the simplest and least cost of all configurations. The system can be easily expanded.
Kong Agent 3RT-
This configuration requires less area. The reliability of this system being low, it is not to be implemented in the
Contactor 3WL-ACB
substation where high reliability is expected. Large substations usually do not utilize this scheme. By
3VL-MCCB
sectionalising of the bus the reliability and availability of the single bus system can be improved.

MVA
Engineering
RTO

Coil &
Transformer

HV and LV
Training

Hochspannun Main Bus and Transfer Bus

gsdiode
In this scheme one more bus is added. See Figure-C how the equipments are arranged and circuits are
connected between main and transfer bus. In this arrangement one more breaker may be used, known as tie
Powered by Blogger. circuit breaker. No circuit is associated with this tie breaker.

When the tie CB is not present, for maintenance of a circuit breaker, the transfer bus is energized by closing
the isolator switches to transfer bus. Then the breaker to undergo maintenance is opened and isolated
(opening isolators on both sides of CB) for maintenance. In this arrangement there is no protection for the
circuits. The circuits can be protected from outside the substation.

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3/16/2014 Electrical Systems: Substation Bus Schemes

When the tie breaker is present, for maintenance of a breaker the transfer bus is energised by closing the tie
breaker. Then the isolator near the transfer bus of the breaker of circuit to be maintained is closed. Now the
breaker to be maintained is opened. Then corresponding isolators on both sides of breaker are opened. The
breaker is removed for maintenance. The circuit is transferred to transfer bus. Remember that the isolator to
the transfer bus corresponding to the breaker not to be maintained remain open. Here the tie breaker protects
the circuit in place of removed breaker. In this scheme the relay setting is quite complex due to the requirement
of the tie breaker to handle each situation for maintenance of any of the other breakers. This scheme is
somewhat more costly than the single bus scheme but is more reliable. The scheme can be easily expanded.
The switching procedure is complicated for maintenance of any circuit breaker. Failure of a breaker or fault on
the bus results in outage of complete substation.

Double Bus Double Breaker

In this scheme there are two buses and two circuit breakers per circuit are used (See Fig-D). In normal state
both the buses are energised. Any circuit breaker can be removed for maintenance without interruption of the
corresponding circuit. Also the failure of one of the two buses does not interrupt any circuit as all the circuits
can be fed from the remaining bus and isolating the failed bus. By shifting circuit from one bus to other the
loading on the buses can be balanced.
The substation with this configuration requires twice as much equipments as single bus scheme. This scheme
has high reliability. But due to more equipments this scheme is costly and requires more space. This scheme is
usually used at EHV transmission substation or generating station where high reliability is required.

Double Bus Single Breaker

This scheme is shown in Fig-E. This scheme has two buses. Each circuit has one breaker and connected to both
buses by isolators as shown. There is one tie breaker between two buses. The tie breaker is normally closed.
For the tie breaker in closed position the circuit can be connected to either of the buses by closing the
corresponding switch. It is clear that fault on one bus requires isolation of the bus and the circuits are fed from
the other bus.

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From the figure you can guess that the configuration has some improvement over the single bus system. This
arrangement has more flexibility in operation than the single bus scheme. This scheme is costlier and requires
more space than the single bus scheme. Many EHV transmission substations use this scheme with an
additional transfer bus.

Ring Bus

The Ring Bus configuration is shown in Fig-F. The breakers are so connected and forms a ring. There are
isolators on both sides of each breaker. Circuits terminate between the breakers. The number of breakers is
same as the numbers of circuits. Each of the circuits in ring bus system is fed from both sides. Any of the
breaker can be opened and isolated for maintenance without interrupting any of the circuits. A fault on any of
the circuit is isolated by tripping of two breakers on both sides of the circuit. By tripping the two breakers only
the faulted circuit is isolated and all other circuits continue to operate in open ring state. This scheme has good
operational flexibility and high reliability. The main disadvantage is that when a fault happens and the ring is
split and may result into two isolated sections. Each of these two sections may not have the proper
combination of source and load circuits. To avoid this as far as possible the source and load circuits should be
connected side by side (see figure). The ring bus scheme can be expanded to accommodate more circuits. The
ring bus scheme is not suitable for more than 6 circuits (although possible). When expansion of the substation
is required to accommodate more circuits, the ring bus scheme can be easily expanded to One and Half
Breaker(See below and compare) scheme. The scheme is required to be planned properly to avoid difficulties in
future expansion.

Breaker and Half

The Breaker and Half scheme has two main buses (Fig G). Both the buses are normally energised. Three
breakers are connected between the buses. The circuits are terminated between the breakers as shown. In
this bus configuration for two circuits three numbers of breakers are required. Hence it is called one and half
scheme. It is something like, for controlling one circuit we require one full and a half breakers. The middle
breaker is shared by both the circuits. Like the ring bus scheme here also each circuit is fed from both the

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3/16/2014 Electrical Systems: Substation Bus Schemes
buses.

Any of the breakers can be opened and removed for maintenance purposes without interrupting supply to any
of the circuits. Also one of the two buses can be removed for maintenance without interruption of the service to
any of the circuits. If fault happens on a bus it is isolated without interruption of supply to any of the circuits. If
the middle circuit breaker fails then the breakers adjacent to the buses are tripped so interrupting both the
circuits. But if a breaker adjacent to the bus fails then the tripping of middle breaker does not interrupt power
supply to circuit associated with healthy breaker. Only the circuit associated with failed breaker is interrupted.

This configuration is very flexible and highly reliable. The relaying of the scheme is complicated as the middle
breaker is associated with both the circuits. This scheme is economical in comparison to Double Bus Double
Breaker scheme. This scheme also require more space in comparison to other schemes to accommodate more
equipments.

In one substation you can find two or more schemes implemented as per the requirement. In most of the
modern substations it is usual to add one transfer bus in most of the schemes above. Which enhances the
availability and maintainability of the system and operational flexibility

Labels: Power System

6 com m ents:

Anonymous said...
excellent

April 15, 2012 at 11:47 AM

Anonymous said...
best of all

August 15, 2012 at 2:55 PM

Anonymous said...
Wow! It's the first time I fall on such a great explanation on this topic.

July 3, 2013 at 11:13 PM

Anonymous said...
Can you explain what a tie CB is

July 17, 2013 at 5:26 AM

ntombenhle ntuli said...

Now I got d good explaination. Thnk you

August 15, 2013 at 3:01 PM

Anonymous said...
I knew I have been around this stuff too long when I started to understand it. Kinda like when I was
working in The U.K., I glanced up at a TV in a pub with a cricket match on and I exclaimed "Hey, that
was 6 runs!"

September 24, 2013 at 11:22 PM

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