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The electrical equipment and circuits in a substation have to be safeguard in order to negate the losses incurr as a result of abnormal currents and overvoltages.
In most cases, all the equipment installed in a power electrical system possess standardized ratings for short-time current. The function of the protections is to guarantee that these withstand limits are not exceed.Therefore dealing with the faults as fast as possible.
In addition to this first requirement, a system of protection must be selective. This means that any fault must be deal with by the device of current interruption (circuit breaker or fuses), even if the fault is identify by other protections associate with other interruption devices. As an example of a short circuit transpiring on the secondary side of a power transformer, only the circuit breaker installed on the secondary must trip. The circuit breaker connect on the primary side should be close in this situation. For a power transformers protected with MV fuses, the fuses must not blow in any situation.
Transformer Protection
Below are the key points for transformer protection :
Supply Causes
Two types of overvoltage stresses that can destroy a transformer:
- The lightning overvoltages cause by lightning stroke .Falling on or near an overhead line supplying the system where the transformer is install
- The switching overvoltages caused by the opening of a circuit breaker or a load break switch for instance.
Depending on the application, protection against these two types of voltage surges may be necessary. And are often ensure by means of surge arresters, that is preferably connect to the MV bushing of the transformer.
Stresses Due To The Load
A transformer overload takes place as a result of an increase in the apparent power demand (kVA) of the installation. The increase in this demand can be the result of either a progressive adjunction of loads or an extension of the installation itself. The impact of any overload is an increase in the temperature of oil. And windings of the transformer which reduces its lifetime.
The protection of a transformer against the overloads is carry by a specific protection usually called thermal overload relay. This type of protection resembles the temperature of the transformer’s windings. The simulation is form on the measure of the current and on the thermal time constant of the transformer. Some relays are able to account for the effect of harmonics of the current caused by non-linear loads such as rectifiers, computers, variable speed drives etc.
This type of relay is also able to estimate the remaining time before the emission of the tripping order and the time delay before re-energizing the transformer.
In addition to this, oil-filled transformers are implement with thermostats controlling the temperature of the oil. Dry-type transformers make use of heat sensors installed in the hottest part of the windings insulation.
In most cases, these devices (thermal relay, thermostat, heat sensors) generally offer two levels of detection:
- A low level used to generate an alarm to advise the maintenance staff,
- A high level to de-energize the transformer.
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