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Lee: Application of High Voltage Current Limiting Fuse Model Using ATP-Draw
ABSTRACT
This paper presents the results of arcing energy by the initiation of arcing, the arc
clearing voltage, the system impedance (X/R), and the making angle. To perform this
analysis, current limiting fuse (CLF) model was developed using the ATP-Draw
program. The violent activation of arc is affected by the voltage level, the voltage rise
rate when the arcing starts, and the minimum and the maximum positions of the
arcing energy that can be moved to zero degree by the X/R, and the more severe
interrupted condition has to be considered. The model developed using ATP-Draw
enables a non-expert to use it without spending excessive time and effort.
Index Terms — Modeling, current limiting fuses, X/R, power factor, arcing energy,
fault current, prospective current.
1 INTRODUCTION interrupt the fault current and the cut-out switch needs a
minimum time of over a minimum of a half cycle. Hence,
THE prospective fault current caused by line-to-line or when the fault is generated faster, current interruption is
line-to-ground faults has increased significantly in recent years required to limit energy inflow. The CLFs are suitable for
because of the increase in power system capacity. This has interrupting in such cases. It can limit the prospective current
generated situations where fault current has exceeded the to less than a quarter cycle after the fault, and then clear the
interrupting rating of the protection system. fault totally within less than a half cycle. To develop the CLFs,
The current limiting fuses (CLF)'s current limiting action research investigating the characteristics of fuse operation
starts over a certain current called the threshold or let-through before testing has been done using computer simulation.
or cut-off current and substantially reduce the amount of In earlier research, several models of CLF were developed
energy and the excessive stresses on the power system because [9-14], most of them based on a mathematical representation
of current limiting, and improve power quality by supporting of the arc physics. These models include transient heating and
the system voltage during operation. Short-circuit tests are fusion of notched strip elements in sand, arc ignition, and
used to verify the performance of fuses during design and subsequent burn-back, radial expansion of the arc channels
development. These tests require the use of high-power-test- due to fusion of the sand, merging of adjacent arcs, and many
laboratory facilities, and are expensive and time-consuming. other second-order effects [15, 16].
Computer modeling of the operation of fuses under these
conditions can be used to study fuse characteristics, and in The simpler empirical model of CLF, developed for use
recent years, there have been significant improvements in the with electromagnetic transient program (EMTP) was carried
accuracy of the fuse models available [1- 4]. out as a function of source voltage making angle [10].
However, the dissipated energy during the operation can be
Nowadays, CLFs are used to protect various types of changed by system impedance (X/R) as well as prospective
equipments on an electric power distribution system. The current and making angle [2-4, 17-21].
protected equipment includes the following items:
transformer, feeders, and section of the system, capacitor, In this paper, modeling with respect to CLF is developed
motors, and circuits with motors on them, etc. [5-8]. more easily using ATP-Draw, which is a graphical mouse-
driven preprocessor for ATP, to allow estimation of the
To interrupt these fault currents, a circuit breaker, a cut-out interrupting performance of CLFs. It has been designed for the
switch and a CLF have been used in the distribution line. The specific purpose of helping research to improve the
circuit breaker needs a minimum time of four cycles to performance of CLF. To observe the influence of the
operating energy by the X/R, the prospective current, and the
making angle, the model based on the test results of actual
Manuscript received on 14 January 2010, in final form 2 September 2010. CLF operation has been carried out.
2 CONSIDERATION OF OPERATION greater than before and the terminal voltage of the fuse rises.
When both the source voltage and the terminal voltage of fuse
A fuse is a part of the distribution line before a fault, but the
become equal, it means the slope of current equals to zero at
fault occurs when the fuse is operated by the short-circuit
that point and the current is limited.
current. The fuse element senses the fault current, melts, arcs,
and the arc plasma is absorbed in the filler. The fulgurite c
created by the arc rapidly increases the resistance of the fuse
element. Because of this resistance, the phase difference a
between current and voltage is small. If the fault is not cleared,
the body of fuse or the tank of the transformer can explode. d e
Therefore, before the fault energy reaches an explosive level,
b
it has to be cleared. CLFs limit the fault energy, I 2 rt more
effectively than conventional breakers or non-limiting fuses.
∫
I 2 t = i 2 dt (2) And then as the current has negative slope, the equation
0 becomes as following.
The I 2 t multiplied by the resistance, unit constant through
which the current flows is equal to the energy(joules). di
V f = VS + L (5)
In Figure 2, before the fuse element is melted the dt
instantaneous current (d) and voltage are related by equation (3).
di VS − V f
V S = i( R + r ) + L
dt
(3) In this case: I=
L ∫ (6)
where the resistance r is non-linear with dependence on Subsequently, the fuse voltage exceeds the source voltage.
parameters of time, heating, etc. The resistance of the fuse As a result the slope of current becomes negative and then zero.
when compared with the line resistance can be ignored. The At this time, the terminal voltage is represented by equation (5).
slope of current after closing is positive and then increases The fuse voltage during arcing is higher than the source voltage
gradually. VS , because V f is the sum of the gradient term and V S . The
di current flows and then decreases, and at that time, if the slope is
V f = VS − L (4) constant, the inductive voltage becomes a constant. The fuse
dt voltage which is the sum of the source voltage and inductive
At t ≈ 0 ,the instantaneous terminal voltage of fuse, (c) is voltage changes with the phase difference becoming zero at the
nearly zero because the inductive voltage (b) is nearly the end. And then after L di is zero, the fuse voltage becomes the
same as the source voltage (a). However after the fuse element dt
melts, its resistance like curve (e), in Figure 2, becomes much same as the source voltage [17].
1808 S.-H. Lee: Application of High Voltage Current Limiting Fuse Model Using ATP-Draw
3 SAMPLE AND EXPERIMENTS voltage is controlled to a level below the specified switching
voltage to prevent damage to other equipments. Hence, the
In Figure 3, the design of CLF used is shown. The fuse
only method to develop the efficiency of the fuse is to keep
element is spirally wound on supporter. Its components are an
the fuse voltage lower than the maximum voltage, which can
outer tube made of glass fiber, a sand filler, an internal
damage other equipments, until the fault current falls to zero.
supporter, which is ceramic with alumina above 70% and a
twisted and pressed fuse element, which is made of silver.
power
5 APPLICATION CONSIDERATIONS
5.1 COMPARISON OF ACTUAL TEST AND THE
SIMULATION
In Figure 7a, the voltage, the current, and the calculated
resistance waveforms from laboratory tests under International
Standard IEC60282-1 with the fuse's rating, 24 kV, 25 A and the
simulated waveforms are compared for the power source, 21 kV,
the prospective current, 1.2 kA, and the system frequency, 60 Hz.
Before After
Switch Condition
status status
SW1 Closed I 2t > melting Opening
arrived at V f in
SW3 Closed Opening
period B
arrived at V f
SW4 Opened Closing
in period B
SW5 Closed maximum V f Opening
Also, the differences of the melting (pre-arcing) energy, the the resistance is gradually larger, because a distribution line
arcing energy, and operating energy (melting energy + arcing is longer. As the X/R is varying, the time required for the
energy) are 0%, 2.84%, and 1.74%, respectively. The results melting or arcing of fuse elements can be differed from the
of experiment and simulation are in agreement within 3% current rise rate caused by the making angle. The high
deviation. As a result, we can see that the CLF model current rise rate decreases the difference between the
developed can be applied to analyze the CLF characteristics making angle and the starting angle of arcing. The
(see Table 1). activation of arc plasma depends on the magnitude of the
source voltage when the arcing starts. If the magnitude of
the voltage is higher and its rise rate is positive, the arc
5.2 COMPARISON OF VOLTAGE AND PROSPECTIVE
during fault can be more violent.
CURRENT BY MAKING ANGLE UNDER THE
DIFFERENT X/R CONDITIONS
5.3 TENDENCY OF ARCING ENERGY BY VARYING
MELTING ENERGY UNDER THE X/R AND MAKING
ANGLE CONDITION
To take an account for the rated current, which is decided
by fuse element’s thickness or material, etc. the melting
time decided as the melting energy is varied and one of the
results is shown in Figure 9. The melting energy, I 2 rt , of
the curves (a), (b) and (c) in Figure 9 is 1 per unit (pu), 7
pu, and 20 pu, respectively. The curves (a’), (b’), and (c’)
are current and the arcing starting point of the curves (a),
(b), and (c) at 74.4°, 106.5°, and 148°, respectively.
Making angle is 40°.
As the melting energy, I 2 rt , is varied, we can see that the
starting angle of arcing and the arcing I 2 rt can be varied.
Making angle[ °]
(a) (b) (c)
Figure 11. Arcing energy of the CLF by the X/R with the different melting
energies at ϕ = 0 ∼ 180 °.
(b’), and (c’) are the current. The curve (B) in Figure 12 is the maximum of arcing energy is 35.5 kJ when the making angle
instantaneous resistance during arcing. The rise rate of resistance is 40° and the X/R is 0.5.
shows a similar tendency, but the time of the position to be above
1000 ohms in curves (a’’), (b’’), and (c’’) is 7.37 ms, 7.97 ms,
and 8.7 ms, respectively. Initially, the resistance curve, (c’’), is
increased among these curves because the arcing clearing voltage
is the highest. The initiation of arcing is similar.
However, the arcing cleared time for 1 pu, 2.4 pu, and 2.7 pu,
is 160°, 172°, and 188°, respectively. Thus, we can conclude that
the arcing energy during the fault can be varied because of the
magnitude and the rise rate of source voltage when the arcing
starts. The arcing energy by making angle and initiation of arcing
is shown in Figure 13.
Making angle[ °]
(a) (b) (c)
Figure 14. Arcing energy of the CLF by the X/R at making
angle ϕ = 0 ∼ 180 °.
In case of curve (c) with the arcing energy of 2.7 pu, the
maximum of arcing energy is 41 kJ when the making angle is
40° and the X/R is 9.4. The maximum of arcing energy is 29.4
kJ when the making angle is 60° and the X/R is 0.5.
Consequently, we can see that the arcing energy shows the
tendency to decrease with the increasing arcing clearing voltage.
With the increasing arcing clearing voltage, the arcing energy is
observed to decrease, because the arcing clearing voltage is
related to the ability of arc quenching. The position of the
maximum and minimum of arcing energy is gradually shifted to
0° with the increase in X/R. Therefore, to increase the ability of
arc quenching, the terminal voltage of CLF should be higher
than the source voltage when the arc is initiated, and the voltage
Figure 13. Arcing energy by making angle and initiation of arcing. should remain unchanged until the arcing is cleared.
The making angle is 40° and 140°. The starting of arcing is 5 CONCLUSION
55° (circle) and 156° (square). The difference is about A fuse model based on experimental results has been
15∼16°. The voltage level is 23 kV when the arcing starts at developed. This model using ATP-Draw is more convenient to
55°. At this time, the voltage rise rate (dv/dt) is positive. When use and can be employed to calculate CLF performance for a
the arcing starts at 140°, the magnitude of voltage is 7.5 kV variety of fault conditions. In this paper, the agreement
and the voltage rise rate (dv/dt) is negative. The arcing energy, between the actual test results and the simulation results is
when the making angle is 40°, is increased by 143% when within 3%. Using this model, the arcing energy characteristics
compared with that when the making angle is 0°. However, of the CLF can be estimated by varying the melting energy,
the arcing energy when the making angle is 140° is decreased the arc clearing voltage, the X/R, and the making angle.
by 22% and its arc energy is minimum. As a result, the initiation of the arcing based on the physical
The starting angle of arcing is an important parameter to characteristics of CLF, although the making angle is the same,
decide the arcing energy. The arcing energy is shown at the can be differed. Furthermore, the activation of arc is affected
making angle from 0 to 180° for the X/R 9.4, 6.6, 1.7, and 0.5, by the voltage level and the voltage rise rate at the initiated
respectively, in Figure 14. Figure 14(a) shows the arcing position of arcing. Moreover, the minimum and maximum of
energy of 1 pu, where the maximum of arcing energy is 63.5 the arcing energy by the X/R is shifted to 0°. Hence, more
kJ when the making angle is 20° and the X/R is 9.4. severe interrupting condition can be moved.
The maximum of arcing energy is 62.9 kJ when the making The developed model can be a valuable tool for designers,
angle is 40° and the X/R is 0.5. In case of curve (b) with the as it can estimate the influence of the fuse operation
arcing energy of 2.4 pu, the maximum of arcing energy is 45 characteristics during fault using parameters and can reduce
kJ when the making angle is 40° and the X/R is 9.4. The spending time and effort for development.
IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation Vol. 17, No. 6; December 2010 1813
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[11] A. Petit, G. St-Jean and G. Fecteau, "Empirical model of a current- Sei Hyun Lee was born in Daejeon, Korea, in 1967. He
limiting fuse using EMTP", IEEE Trans. Power Delivery, Vol. 4, pp. received the B.Sc., M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical
335-341, 1989. engineering from the Chungnam National University,
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associate professor of electrical measurement and control
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engineering since 1997. He was with the University of
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His main research interests are surge suppressors, lightning arresters, high
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