Distance relay impedance

Some numerical relays measure the absolute fault impedance and then
determine whether operation is required according to impedance boundaries
defined on the R/X diagram. Traditional distance relays and numerical relays
that emulate the impedance elements of traditional relays do not measure
absolute impedance.

Eight most important distance relay characteristics (based on impedance

comparison)
They compare the measured fault voltage with a replica voltage derived from
the fault current and the zone impedance setting to determine whether the fault
is within zone or out-of-zone. Distance relay impedance comparators or
algorithms which emulate traditional comparators are classified according to
their polar characteristics, the number of signal inputs they have, and the
method by which signal comparisons are made.
The common types compare either the relative amplitude or phase of two input
quantities to obtain operating characteristics that are either straight lines or
circles when plotted on an R/X diagram.

Please note that this technical article is not about the basics of distance
protection. But, just in case, let’s say a few introduction words:

The basic principle of distance protection involves the division of the voltage at
the relaying point by the measured current. The apparent impedance so
calculated is compared with the reach point impedance. If the measured
impedance is less than the reach point impedance, it is assumed that a
fault exists on the line between the relay and the reach point.
At each stage of distance relay design evolution, the development of
impedance operating characteristic shapes and sophistication has been
governed by the technology available and the acceptable cost.

Since many traditional relays are still in service and since some numerical
relays emulate the techniques of the traditional relays, a brief review
of impedance comparators is justified.

Contents:
1. Amplitude and phase comparison
2. Plain impedance characteristic
3. Self-polarised Mho relay
4. Offset Mho/Lenticular characteristics
5. Fully Cross-Polarised Mho characteristic
6. Partially Cross-Polarised Mho characteristic
7. Quadrilateral characteristic
8. Protection against power swings
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1. Amplitude and Phase Comparison

Relay measuring elements whose functionality is based on the comparison of
two independent quantities are essentially either amplitude or phase
comparators. For the impedance elements of a distance relay, the quantities
being compared are the voltage and current measured by the relay.
There are numerous techniques available for performing the
comparison, depending on the technology used. They vary from balanced-beam
(amplitude comparison) and induction cup (phase comparison) electromagnetic
relays, through diode and operational amplifier comparators in static-type
distance relays, to digital sequence comparators in digital relays and
to algorithms used in numerical relays.
Any type of impedance characteristic obtainable with one comparator is also
obtainable with the other. The addition and subtraction of the signals for one
type of comparator produces the required signals to obtain a similar
characteristic using the other type.

For example, comparing V and I in an amplitude comparator results in a circular impedance

characteristic centred at the origin of the R/X diagram. If the sum and difference of V and I

are applied to the phase comparator the result is a similar characteristic.

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2. Plain Impedance Characteristic

This characteristic takes no account of the phase angle between the current
and the voltage applied to it. For this reason its impedance characteristic when
plotted on an R/X diagram is a circle with its centre at the origin of the
coordinates and of radius equal to its setting in ohms.

Operation occurs for all impedance values less than the setting, that is, for all
points within the circle.

The relay characteristic, shown in Figure 1, is therefore non-directional, and in

this form would operate for all faults along the vector AL and also for all faults
behind the busbars up to an impedance AM. A is the relaying point and RAB is
the angle by which the fault current lags the relay voltage for a fault on the
line AB and RAC is the equivalent leading angle for a fault on line AC.

Vector AB represents the impedance in front of the relay between the relaying
point A and the end of line AB. Vector AC represents the impedance of
line AC behind the relaying point.
AL represents the reach of instantaneous Zone 1 protection, set to cover 80%
to 85% of the protected line.

Figure 1 – Plain impedance relay

characteristic
A relay using this characteristic has three important disadvantages:

1. It is non-directional. It will see faults both in front of and behind the relaying
point, and therefore requires a directional element to give it correct
discrimination.
2. It has non-uniform fault resistance coverage
3. It is susceptible to power swings and heavy loading of a long line because of
the large area covered by the impedance circle.
Directional control is an essential discrimination quality for a distance
relay, to make the relay non-responsive to faults outside the protected line. This
can be obtained by the addition of a separate directional control element.
The impedance characteristic of a directional control element is a straight line
on the R/X diagram, so the combined characteristic of the directional and
impedance relays is the semi-circle APLQ shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 – Combined
directional and impedance relays
If a fault occurs at F close to C on the parallel line CD, the directional unit
RD at A will restrain due to current IF1. At the same time, the impedance unit is
prevented from operating by the inhibiting output of unit RD. If this control is not
provided, the under impedance element could operate prior to circuit breaker
C opening.

Reversal of current through the relay from IF1 to IF2 when C opens could then
result in incorrect tripping of the healthy line if the directional unit RD operates
before the impedance unit resets.

This is an example of the need to consider the proper co-ordination of

multiple relay elements to attain reliable relay performance during evolving
fault conditions.
In older relay designs, the type of problem to be addressed was commonly
referred to as one of ‘contact race’.

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3. Self-Polarised Mho Relay

The mho impedance element is generally known as such because its
characteristic is a straight line on an admittance diagram.

It cleverly combines the discriminating qualities of both reach control and

directional control, thereby eliminating the ‘contact race’ problems that may
be encountered with separate reach and directional control elements.

This is achieved by the addition of a polarising signal.

Mho impedance elements were particularly attractive for economic reasons

where electromechanical relay elements were employed. As a result, they have
been widely deployed worldwide for many years and their advantages and
limitations are now well understood. For this reason they are still emulated in
the algorithms of some modern numerical relays.
The characteristic of a mho impedance element, when plotted on an R/X
diagram, is a circle whose circumference passes through the origin, as
illustrated in Figure 3 below.
characteristic
This demonstrates that the impedance element is inherently directional and
such that it will operate only for faults in the forward direction along line AB.

The impedance characteristic is adjusted by setting Zn, the impedance reach,

along the diameter and φ, the angle of displacement of the diameter from the R
axis. Angle φ is known as the Relay Characteristic Angle (RCA). The
relay operates for values of fault impedance ZF within its characteristic.
The self-polarised mho characteristic can be obtained using a phase
comparator circuit which compares input signals S2 and S1 and operates
whenever S2 lags S1 by between 90° and 270° as shown in the voltage diagram
of Figure 3(a).

The two input signals are:

S2 = V-IZn
S1 = V
where:

 V = fault voltage from VT secondary

 I = fault current from CT secondary
 Zn = impedance setting of the zone
The characteristic of Figure 3(a) can be converted to the impedance plane of
Figure 3(b) by dividing each voltage by I.

The impedance reach varies with fault angle. As the line to be protected is
made up of resistance and inductance, its fault angle will be dependent upon
the relative values of R and X at the system operating frequency.

Under an arcing fault condition, or an earth fault involving additional

resistance, such as tower footing resistance or fault through vegetation, the
value of the resistive component of fault impedance will increase to change the
impedance angle. Thus a relay having a characteristic angle equivalent to
the line angle will underreach under resistive fault conditions.
Some users set the RCA less than the line angle, so that it is possible to accept
a small amount of fault resistance without causing under-reach.

However, when setting the relay, the difference between the line angle θ and
the relay characteristic angle Ø must be known. The resulting characteristic is
shown in Figure 3 where GL corresponds to the length of the line to be
protected.
With Ø set less than θ, the actual amount of line protected, AB, would be equal
to the relay setting value AQ multiplied by cosine (θ−Ø).

Therefore the required relay setting AQ is given by:

AQ = AB / cos(θ−Ø)
Due to the physical nature of an arc, there is a non-linear relationship between
arc voltage and arc current, which results in a non-linear resistance. Using the
empirical formula derived by A.R. van C. Warrington, the approximate value of
arc resistance can be assessed as:

Ra = L × 28,710 / I1.4
where:

 Ra = arc resistence (ohms)

 L = length of arc (metres)
 I = arc current (A)
On long overhead lines carried on steel towers with overhead earth wires the
effect of arc resistance can usually be neglected. The effect is most significant
on short overhead lines and with fault currents below 2000A (i.e. minimum
plant condition), or if the protected line is of wood-pole construction without
earth wires.

In the latter case, the earth fault resistance reduces the effective earth-fault
reach of a ‘mho’ Zone 1 element to such an extent that the majority of faults are
detected in Zone 2 time.

This problem can usually be overcome by using a relay with a cross-

polarised mho or a polygonal characteristic.

Where a power system is resistance-earthed, it should be appreciated that this

does not need to be considered with regard to the relay settings other than
the effect that reduced fault current may have on the value of arc resistance
seen. The earthing resistance is in the source behind the relay and only
modifies the source angle and source to line impedance ratio for earth faults.
It would therefore be taken into account only when assessing relay performance
in terms of system impedance ratio.

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4. Offset Mho / Lenticular Characteristics
Under close up fault conditions, when the relay voltage falls to zero or near-
zero, a relay using a self-polarised mho characteristic or any other form of self-
polarised directional impedance characteristic may fail to operate when it
is required to do so.

Methods of covering this condition include the use of non-directional

impedance characteristics, such as offset mho, offset lenticular, or cross-
polarised and memory polarised directional impedance characteristics.
If current bias is employed, the mho characteristic is shifted to embrace the
origin, so that the measuring element can operate for close-up faults in both the
forward and the reverse directions.

The offset mho relay has two main applications:

4.1 Third Zone and Busbar Back-Up Zone

In this application it is used in conjunction with mho measuring units as a
fault detector and/or Zone 3 measuring unit. So, with the reverse reach
arranged to extend into the busbar zone, as shown in Figure 4, it will provide
back-up protection for busbar faults.
 Figure 4 – Typical applications for
the offset mho relay
This facility can also be provided with quadrilateral characteristics. A further
benefit of the Zone 3 application is for Switch-on-to-Fault (SOTF) protection,
where the Zone 3 time delay would be bypassed for a short period immediately
following line energization to allow rapid clearance of a fault anywhere along the
protected line.
4.2 Carrier Starting Unit in Distance Schemes With Carrier
Blocking
If the offset mho unit is used for starting carrier signaling, it is arranged as
shown in Figure 4 above. The carrier is transmitted if the fault is external to the
protected line but inside the reach of the offset mho relay, to prevent
accelerated tripping of the second or third zone relay at the remote station.

Transmission is prevented for internal faults by operation of the local

mho measuring units, which allows high-speed fault clearance by the local and
remote end circuit breakers.

4.3 Application of Lenticular Characteristic

There is a danger that the offset mho relay shown in Figure 4 may operate
under maximum load transfer conditions if Zone 3 of the relay has a large reach
setting. A large Zone 3 reach may be required to provide remote back-up
protection for faults on the adjacent feeder.

To avoid this, a shaped type of characteristic may be used, where the resistive
coverage is restricted.

With a ‘lenticular’ characteristic, the aspect ratio of the lens (a/b) is

adjustable, enabling it to be set to provide the maximum fault resistance
coverage consistent with non-operation under maximum load transfer
conditions.
Figure 5 shows how the lenticular characteristic can tolerate much higher
degrees of line loading than offset mho and plain impedance characteristics.

Reduction of load impedance from ZD3 to ZD1 will correspond to an

equivalent increase in load current.
 Figure 5 –
Minimum load impedance permitted with lenticular, offset mho and impedance relays
It can be observed in Figure 5 how the load area is defined according to a
minimum impedance arc, constrained by straight lines which emanate from the
origin, 0.

Modern numerical relays typically do not use lenticular characteristic shaping,

but instead use load encroachment (load blinder) detection. This allows a
full mho characteristic to be used, but with tripping prevented in the region of
the impedance plane known to be frequented by load (Z A-ZB-ZC-ZD).

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5. Fully Cross-Polarised Mho Characteristic

The previous section showed how the non-directional offset mho characteristic
is inherently able to operate for close-up zero voltage faults, where there would
be no polarising voltage to allow operation of a plain mho directional element.
One way of ensuring correct mho element response for zero-voltage faults is to add a

percentage of voltage from the healthy phase(s) to the main polarising voltage as a substitute

phase reference. This technique is called cross-polarising, and it has the advantage of

preserving and indeed enhancing the directional properties of the mho characteristic.

By the use of a phase voltage memory system, that provides several cycles
of pre-fault voltage reference during a fault, the cross-polarisation technique
is also effective for close-up three-phase faults. For this type of fault, no
healthy phase voltage reference is available.

Modern digital or numerical systems can offer a synchronous phase reference

for variations in power system frequency before or even during a fault.

As described in above Section 3 (Self-polarised Mho relay), a disadvantage of

the self-polarised, plain mho impedance characteristic, when applied
to overhead line circuits with high impedance angles, is that it has limited
coverage of arc or fault resistance. The problem is aggravated in the case of
short lines, since the required Zone 1 ohmic setting is low.
The amount of the resistive coverage offered by the mho circle is directly
related to the forward reach setting. Hence, the resulting resistive coverage
may be too small in relation to the expected values of fault resistance.

One additional benefit of applying cross-polarisation to a mho impedance element is that its

resistive coverage will be enhanced.

This effect is illustrated in Figure 6, for the case where a mho element has
100% cross-polarisation. With cross-polarisation from the healthy phase(s) or
from a memory system, the mho resistive expansion will occur during
a balanced three-phase fault as well as for unbalanced faults.

The expansion will not occur under load conditions, when there is no phase
shift between the measured voltage and the polarising voltage. The degree of
resistive reach enhancement depends on the ratio of source impedance to
relay reach (impedance) setting as can be deduced by reference to Figure 6.
 Figure 6 – Fully cross-
polarised mho relay characteristic with variations of ZS/ZL ratio
It must be emphasised that the apparent extension of a fully cross-polarised
impedance characteristic into the negative reactance quadrants of Figure 7
does not imply that there would be operation for reverse faults.

With cross-polarisation, the relay characteristic expands to encompass the

origin of the impedance diagram for forward faults only.

For reverse faults, the effect is to exclude the origin of the impedance
diagram, thereby ensuring proper directional responses for close-up forward or
reverse faults.
 Figure 7 – Illustration of
improvement in relay resistive coverage for fully cross-polarised characteristic
Fully cross-polarised characteristics have now largely been superseded, due to
the tendency of comparators connected to healthy phases to operate under
heavy fault conditions on another phase.

This is of no consequence in a switched distance relay, where a single

comparator is connected to the correct fault loop impedance by starting units
before measurement begins.
However, modern relays offer independent impedance measurement for each of the

three earth-fault and three phase-fault loops. For these types of relay, mal-operation of

healthy phases is undesirable, especially when single-pole tripping is required for single-

phase faults.

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6. Partially Cross-Polarised Mho Characteristic

Where a reliable, independent method of faulted phase selection is not
provided, a modern non-switched distance relay may only employ a relatively
small percentage of cross polarisation.

The level selected must be sufficient to provide reliable directional control in

the presence of capacitor voltage transformer (CVT) transients for close-up
faults, and also attain reliable faulted phase selection. By employing only partial
cross-polarisation, the disadvantages of the fully cross-polarised characteristic
are avoided, while still retaining the advantages.
Figure 8 shows a typical characteristic that can be obtained using this
technique (reference Micromho, Quadramho and Optimho family).
 Figure 8 –
Partially cross-polarised characteristic with ‘shield’ shape

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7. Quadrilateral Characteristic
This form of polygonal impedance characteristic is shown in Figure 9. The
characteristic is provided with forward reach and resistive reach settings that
are independently adjustable. It therefore provides better resistive coverage
than any mho-type characteristic for short lines.

This is especially true for earth fault impedance measurement, where the
arc resistances and fault resistance to earth contribute to the highest values of
fault resistance.

To avoid excessive errors in the zone reach accuracy, it is common to impose a

maximum resistive reach in terms of the zone impedance reach. Recommendations in this

respect can usually be found in the appropriate relay manuals.

Figure 9 –
Quadrilateral characteristic
Quadrilateral elements with plain reactance reach lines can introduce reach
error problems for resistive earth faults where the angle of total fault current
differs from the angle of the current measured by the relay. This will be the case
where the local and remote source voltage vectors are phase shifted
with respect to each other due to pre-fault power flow.
This can be overcome by selecting an alternative to use of a phase current for
polarisation of the reactance reach line.

Polygonal impedance characteristics are highly flexible in terms of

fault impedance coverage for both phase and earth faults. For this reason, most
digital and numerical distance relays now offer this form of characteristic.
A further factor is that the additional cost implications of implementing this
characteristic using discrete component electromechanical or early static relay
technology do not arise.

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8. Protection against Power Swings – Use of the

Ohm Characteristic
During severe power swing conditions from which a system is unlikely to
recover, stability might only be regained if the swinging sources are
separated.

Where such scenarios are identified, power swing, or out-of-step, tripping

protection can be deployed, to strategically split a power system at a preferred
location. Ideally, the split should be made so that the plant capacity and
connected loads on either side of the split are matched.

This type of disturbance cannot normally be correctly identified by an ordinary

distance protection.

As previously mentioned, it is often necessary to prevent distance protection

schemes from operating during stable or unstable power swings, to
avoid cascade tripping. To initiate system separation for a prospective
unstable power swing, an out-of-step tripping scheme employing ohm
impedance measuring elements can be deployed.
Ohm impedance characteristics are applied along the forward and reverse
resistance axes of the R/X diagram and their operating boundaries are set to be
parallel to the protected line impedance vector, as shown in Figure 10.
 Figure 10 – Application of out-
of-step tripping relay characteristic
The ohm impedance elements divide the R/X impedance diagram into three
zones, A, B and C. As the impedance changes during a power swing, the point
representing the impedance moves along the swing locus, entering the
three zones in turn and causing the ohm units to operate in sequence.

When the impedance enters the third zone the trip sequence is completed and
the circuit breaker trip coil can be energized at a favourable angle between
system sources for arc interruption with little risk of restriking.
Only an unstable power swing condition can cause the impedance vector to
move successively through the three zones.

Therefore, other types of system disturbance, such as power system fault conditions, will not

result in relay element operation.