A New PMU-Based Fault Location Algorithm for Series Compensated Lines

This work presents a new fault location algorithm based on phasor measurement units (PMUs) for series compensated lines. Traditionally, the voltage drop of a series device is computed by the device model in the fault locator of series compensated lines, but by using this approach errors are induced by the inaccuracy of the series device model or the uncertainty operation mode of the series device. The proposed algorithm does not utilize the series device model or knowledge of the operation mode of the series device to compute the voltage drop during the fault period. Instead, the proposed algorithm uses the two-step algorithm, prelocation step and correction step, to calculate the voltage drop and fault location. The proposed technique can be easily applied to any series FACTS compensated line. EMTP generated data using a 300 km, 345 kV transmission line has been used to test the accuracy of the proposed algorithm. The tested cases include various fault types, fault locations, fault resistances, fault inception angles, etc. The study also considers the effect of various operation modes of the compensated device during the fault period. Simulation results indicate that the proposed algorithm can achieve up to 99.95% accuracy for most tested cases.