International Journal of Electrical and Computer Engineering (IJECE)

Vol. 8, No. 6, December 2018, pp. 4089~4095

ISSN: 2088-8708, DOI: 10.11591/ijece.v8i6.pp4089-4095  4089

Transient Monitoring Function based Fault Classifier for

Relaying Applications

P. R. Pattanaik, S. Pati, S. K. Sanyal

Department of Electrical Engineering, Shiksha ‘O’ Anusandhan Demmed University, India

Article Info ABSTRACT

Article history: This paper proposes Transient monitoring function (TMF) based fault
classification approach for transmission line protection. The classifier
Received Oct 16, 2017 provides accurate results under various system conditions involving fault
Revised Jul 13, 2018 resistance, inception angle, location and load angle. The transient component
Accepted Aug 8, 2018 during fault is measured by TMF and appropriate logics applied for fault
classification. Simulation studies using MATLAB®/SIMULINK™ are carried
out for a 400 kV, 50 Hz power system with variable system conditions.
Keyword: Results show that the proposed classifier has high classification accuracy.
The method developed has been compared with a fault classification
Distance relay technique based on Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT). The proposed
Line protection technique can be implemented for real time protection schemes employing
Protective relaying distance relaying.
Transient monitoring function
Fault classification Copyright © 2018 Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science.
All rights reserved.

Corresponding Author:
P.R. Pattanaik,
Department of Electrical Engineering,
Shiksha ‘O’ Anusandhan University,
Bhubaneswar, India.
E-mail: ranjanpatanaik@gmail.com

1. INTRODUCTION
Distance relay connected to a transmission line is required to operate for all types of fault within the
protected zone. It is essential to determine correct type of fault in case of digital relaying for transmission line
protection. The trip boundary is set according to the fault type as impedance seen by distance relay is not
same for all types of fault [1]. Fault classification and location in a transmission line have been determined
using modular artificial neural networks (ANNs) [2]. Optimal probabilistic neural network (PNN) with
particle swarm optimization technique (PSO) has been considered for fault classification in a high voltage
line [3]. PNN based method using Discrete wavelet transforms (DWT) are applied for classifying faults
wherein DWT acts as an extractor of distinctive feature of input current signal [4]-[6]. Protection techniques
based on different types of ANNs such as generalized neural networks, unsupervised/supervised neural
networks, online trained neural networks and radial function basis neural networks are presented in [7]-[11].
Principle component analysis (PCA) based techniques have been applied to identify and classify faults in
three phase transmission lines [12].
Literature shows neuro-fuzzy based techniques are widely considered for fault classification in
modern power system involving complex networks [13]. ANN trained network can only be used in a system
for which it is trained and implementing the same ANN to other network becomes cumbersome. An 8-bit
microprocessor based technique for real time implementation is proposed in [14]. In this method voltage
phasors are obtained using Kalman filtering and processed through a MC6809B microcontroller to
distinguish between various classes of faults. The identification and classification of faults in HVDC system
using wavelet analysis has been proposed in [15]. A deterministic fault classification method had been
proposed in [16]. Linear perceptron based algorithm has been suggested to distinguish between grounded and

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4090  ISSN: 2088-8708

ungrounded faults for a distribution system [17]. The TMF has been used to differentiate between fault and a
power swing to prevent maloperation of distance relay in zone-3 [18], [19].
This paper proposes a TMF based fault classifier wherein transient monitor (TM) indices of three
phases are computed. The faulted phase TM index will exceed the threshold value and fault type can be
identified through proposed logics. The phasor extraction of fundamental component of current signal is used
to obtain the reconstructed signal. The phasor extraction accuracy of one-cycle DFT being high results in
reduction of threshold value. The proposed method has been compared with wavelet transform based
technique [16]. A 400 kV system has been simulated for different types of faults considering several factors.

2. FAULT CLASSIFICATION TECHNIQUES

2.1. Fault Classification Using DWT
Discrete wavelet transform (DWT) can effectively analyse transient current and voltage. DWT
analyse signals in different frequency band using short window for high frequency and long window for low
frequency [20]. Therefore signal can be analysed in both time and frequency domain. Wavelet decomposes
the signal in different frequency bands obtained from mother wavelet by dilation and translation. The wavelet
transform of signal f(t) can be represented by following equation as:


1 t q
WT ( f , p, q)  
p 
f (t )w
 p 

(1)

where ‘p’, ‘q’ and ‘w’ are scaling constant, translation constant and wavelet function respectively. Discrete
wavelet transform can be applied to transform of sampled waveforms as:

nk h
1  p
DWT ( f , h, j )  k f (t )w h 0 
h
p0  p 
 0  (2)

where ‘p0h’ and ‘kp0h’ are scaling constant and translation constant respectively.
The DWT can be implemented with successive pairs of high pass and low pass filters at each scaling
stage. This is equivalent to successive approximation of same function where each approximation gives the
incremental information referred to a particular scale. The shorter scale involves high frequency range and
longer scale refers to low frequency of the spectrum. DWT decomposes a signal into a set of approximate
and detailed coefficients. The wavelet transform based fault classification analysis involves mean of the
approximate coefficients obtained from the DWT of each phase current at scale 1 and absolute value of the
means are termed as Ma, Mb and Mc respectively. Determination of fault type is carried out with logics shown
in Table 1.

Table 1. Fault Classification logics for DWT Technique

Fault Type Fault Classification Logics
A-G Ma >Mb & Ma > Mc & Mb= Mc
B-G Mb >Ma & Mb > Mc & Ma= Mc
C-G Mc >Ma & Mc > Mb & Ma= Mb
A-B-G Ma >Mc & Mb > Mc & Ma+ Mb ≥ 2 Mc
B-C-G Mb >Ma & Mc > Ma & Mb+ Mc ≥ 2 Ma
C-A-G Ma >Mb & Mc > Ma & Ma+ Mc ≥ 2 Mb
A-B Ma >Mc & Mb > Mc & Ma= Mc
B-C Mb >Ma & Mc > Ma & Mb= Mc
C-A Mb >Ma & Ma > Mb & Ma= Mc
A-B-C (Ma ≠ Mb ≠ Mc)& ( Ma + Mb = Mc )& (Mb + Mc = Ma)& (Ma + Mc = Mb)

2.2. Transient Monitoring Function

The fundamental component of current signal can be extracted by using a phasor estimation
technique [1]. One cycle DFT has been considered for phasor estimation in order to reconstruct a signal from
its phasor value at a given instant. In normal condition there will be no difference between the actual current
signal and the reconstructed one. However any type of fault initiation results in significant difference
between the two signals due to presence of transient component in fault signal. The absolute sum of squared
difference between the actual signal and reconstructed signal over one cycle window length termed as TMF.

Int J Elec & Comp Eng, Vol. 8, No. 6, December 2018 : 4089 - 4095
Int J Elec & Comp Eng ISSN: 2088-8708  4091

Transient monitoring had been applied to determine the accuracy of phasor estimation [20]. In this paper
TMF is used as a fault classifier. The mathematical formulation of the TMF using Fourier transform
approach has been outlined as follows.
In the present paper fundamental frequency phasor value at each instant can be calculated using one
cycle DFT. A data window of one cycle continuously moves forward and adds one sample corresponds to
that instant. The phasor calculation for transient period will provide value for 50 Hz only. The current signal
is reconstructed with phasor values obtained and compared with actual current signal. It can be observed
from Figure 1 that during transient period two signals mismatches and TMF value increases. A sinusoidal
current signal can be expressed as

ik  I m cos (α  ) (3)

where Im is the amplitude of current signal, k is the sample number, φ is the phase angle in radians and
α=2π/N (N is one cycle window length). DFT of the sinusoidal current signal corresponding to fundamental
frequency is

N 1 2Π
2 j
i e
k
I1  k
N
N k 0 (4)

where I1 is the phasor estimated in terms of peak and can also be represented as

I1  I me j
(5)

The signal can be reconstructed by using phasor values at each instant as


i k  [Ime j ]e jω0 kTs
(6)

where Ts is the sampling time and ω0 is the fundamental angular frequency. According to the definition of the
TMF, it can be expressed as
N
TMF   Ck
k 1 (7)
where

Ck  (ik  i k )2
(8)

At the inception of any type of fault, large transients will be observed in fault signal and TMF will
maintain high index for few cycles. It can be observed from Figure 1 that actual current signal exactly
matches with reconstructed current signal before fault initiation (at 0.5s). There occurs a mismatch during
transient period although TMF maintains zero index value before fault and changing significantly during
transient period. Fault classification is carried out using post fault current data of the three phases at one end
of the line. Using these data TM indices for the three phases and ground are calculated and termed as TMa,
TMb, TMc, and TMg where suffices a, b, c and g relate to phase A, phase B, phase C and ground respectively.

 FIT 
TM a  TMFa   N 
 S
T 

(9)
 FIT 
TM b  TMFb   N 
 S
T 

(10)
 FIT 
TM c  TMFc   N 
 TS  (11)

Transient Monitoring Function Based Fault Classifier for Relaying Applications (P. R. Pattanaik)
4092  ISSN: 2088-8708

 FIT 
TM g  TMFg   N 
 TS  (12)

Where, FIT is the fault inception time. A delay of one cycle is considered for higher value of TM index. The
total time taken for fault classification lies between one cycle and two cycles. The proposed fault
classification technique requires accurate fault detection as a prerequisite. The logics for determining
different types of faults are developed in terms of TM indices as illustrated in Table 2.

Figure 1. (a) Comparison between actual and reconstructed signal. (b) Transient monitor

Table 2. Fault Classification logics for TMF method

Fault Type Fault Classification Logics
A-G TMa ≥ hp & TMb< hp & TMc< hp & TMg ≥ hg
B-G TMa < hp & TMb≥ hp & TMc< hp & TMg ≥ hg
C-G TMa < hp & TMb< hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg ≥ hg
A-B-G TMa ≥ hp & TMb ≥ hp & TMc< hp & TMg ≥ hg
B-C-G TMa < hp & TMb ≥ hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg ≥ hg
C-A-G TMa ≥ hp & TMb< hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg ≥ hg
A-B TMa ≥ hp & TMb ≥ hp & TMc < hp & TMg < hg
B-C TMa < hp & TMb ≥ hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg < hg
C-A TMa ≥ hp & TMb < hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg < hg
A-B-C TMa ≥ hp & TMb ≥ hp & TMc ≥ hp & TMg < hg
‘hp’ and ‘hg’ are the thresholds for phase and ground indexes respectively.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

A two terminal, 400 kV, 3 phases, 128 Km transmission line model has been considered as shown in
Figure 2. The proposed classification method has been compared with DWT technique to show effectiveness
and accuracy of TMF based classifier. All parameters related to the transmission line model are given in
Appendix I.

Figure 2. Transmission Line model

Extensive simulation studies using MATLAB®/SIMULINK™ have been carried out for variations in
the values of fault resistance (RF), fault inception angle (FIA), fault location (d) and load angle (δ).
Normalized phase currents are processed and classification indices of DWT and TMF for phase and ground

Int J Elec & Comp Eng, Vol. 8, No. 6, December 2018 : 4089 - 4095
Int J Elec & Comp Eng ISSN: 2088-8708  4093

are obtained for different types of fault under various system conditions. The indices value obtained for DWT
and TMF method are given in Table 3 and Table 4 respectively. It is found from Table 3 that in few instances
DWT indices fail to satisfy their corresponding logics with respect to fault type under particular system
condition. Table 4 shows TMF indices satisfy their corresponding logics under the same system condition.

Table 3. Values of DWT indices for various operating conditions

Fault Condition:
Fault Type |Ma| |Mb| |Mc| |Mg|
d, RF, FIA, δ
0.5, 50Ω, 20º, 20° 0.0024 0.0100 0.0069 0.0020
0.1, 00Ω, 45º, 20° 0.2353 0.0104 0.0273 0.0910
A-G
0.9, 10Ω, 25°,10º 0.0132 0.0121 0.0042 0.0018
0.5, 50Ω, 20º, 20° 0.002 4.334 6.691 0.571
0.1, 05Ω, 60º, 30° 0.071 76.73 121.1 3.848
B-C-G
0.9, 100Ω, 90°,10º 0.006 1.470 1.600 0.113
0.5, 10Ω, 20º, 30° 0.000 13.53 13.24 0.000
0.1, 02Ω, 85º, 15° 0.000 727.3 731.8 0.000
B-C
0.9, 50Ω, 50°,20º 0.000 1.152 1.148 0.000

Table 4. Values of TM indices for various operating conditions

Fault Condition:
Fault Type TMa TMb TMc TMg
d, RF, FIA, δ
0.5, 50Ω, 20º, 20° 5.457 0.002 0.002 0.600
0.1, 00Ω, 45º, 20° 258.7 0.731 0.729 35.12
A-G
0.9, 10Ω, 25°,10º 49.68 0.267 0.267 4.028
0.5, 50Ω, 20º, 20° 0.002 4.334 6.691 0.571
0.1, 05Ω, 60º, 30° 0.071 76.73 121.1 3.848
B-C-G
0.9, 100Ω, 90°,10º 0.006 1.470 1.600 0.113
0.5, 10Ω, 20º, 30° 0.000 13.53 13.24 0.000
0.1, 02Ω, 85º, 15° 0.000 727.3 731.8 0.000
B-C
0.9, 50Ω, 50°,20º 0.000 1.152 1.148 0.000

In literature different types of fault classification logics are found based on their fault classifier
indices. The classifier index for three phases has been compared with each other. Alternatively the indices
may be compared with a pre specified threshold value. In DWT technique |M| indices are compared with
each other leading to inaccurate results due to a small margin between phase indices. It can be observed from
Tables 1 and 3 that logics based on comparison of phase indices results in false identification of fault type.
TM indices are compared with a threshold value resulting in accurate identification of fault type. The value
of thresholds ‘hp’ and ‘hg’ are taken as 1 and 0.01 respectively. Optimal threshold is necessary to obtain
accurate fault classification. Values of TMa and TMg for A-G fault are greater than hp and hg respectively
whereas values of TMb and TMc smaller than hp. The results obtained shown in Table 4 validates the logics
of Table 2 for other types of faults.
Threshold value may depend upon constraints such as noise, harmonics, frequency variation and
sampling rate. Phasor estimation quality affects the threshold value since phasor estimation accuracy decides
similarity between actual and reconstructed signals. The difference between these two signals under prefault
condition remains low leading to a very high value during fault conditions. One cycle delay after FIT is
considered for high value of TM index as high threshold value avoids inaccurate classification.
In the proposed method probability of correctness (Pc) is obtained for different cases to validate high
classification accuracy. The parameter variation in each case over a long range has been studied in order to
calculate Pc. The sample space in each case consists of total number of parameter variation and favorable
events pertaining to total number of correct classification. Mathematically ‘Pc’ can be expressed as:

𝑁𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑟𝑒𝑐𝑡 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑓𝑖𝑐𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛

𝑃𝐶 = × 100 (13)
𝑁𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑖𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑠𝑡𝑒𝑝𝑠 𝑖𝑛 𝑒𝑎𝑐ℎ 𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑒

The results using TMF shown in Table 5 reveal that the proposed method has high accuracy for
wide range of operating conditions. The computation has been made for variation in RF up to 130 Ω, d and δ
up to 0.95 (p.u) line length and 50º respectively. The transmission line resistance upto the fault point and
fault resistance influence performance of proposed classifier. The low resistance results in high transient
leading to increased mutual inductance between phases. High mutual inductance generate transient in healthy
phases. TM indices of healthy phases increase due to presence of transients. The problem of high mutual
inductance effect may be eliminated with the design of appropriate filters. It is found that proposed classifier

Transient Monitoring Function Based Fault Classifier for Relaying Applications (P. R. Pattanaik)
4094  ISSN: 2088-8708

is not affected due variation in fault inception angle and load angle. The proposed technique is simple and
straightforward as it requires a DFT based filtering algorithm and difference between two signals.

Table 5. Classification accuracy of TMF method

Fault Type Fixed Conditions Variable parameter Step Size Pc
A-G d=0.5, FIA=45º, δ=20º RF= 0Ω to 135Ω 1Ω 96.30 %
B-C-G FIA=10º,δ=10º,RF=50Ω d=0.01 to 0.95 0.01 (p.u) 98.90 %
A-C δ=10º,RF=100Ω, d=0.5 FIA = 0º to 360º 1º 100.00 %
A-C-G RF=100Ω,d=0.5,FIA=30º δ = 5º to 50º 1º 100.0

4. CONCLUSION
A simple method for fault classification of power system has been proposed. The method employs a
transient monitoring function based technique using current signals at one end of the line. Requisite logics
with threshold values have been found to classify different type of fault. Simulation studies for various type
of fault have been carried out. The effects of fault location, fault inception angle, fault resistance and load
angle have been considered. It has been found that results obtained using proposed method are highly
accurate compared to the Discrete Wavelet transform based method.

ACKNOWLEDMENTS
The authors acknowledge help and support provided by S‘O’A Demmed University, Bhubaneswar.

APPENDIX I
The system information is given for power system operating at 50 Hz. For all instance negative
sequence impedance is equal to positive sequence impedance.
I. Source voltages:
 Source 1: E1=400 kV
 Source 2: E2=400∠δ kV, where δ is the power angle.
II. Source impedance: (Source 1)
 Positive sequence impedance=1.74+j19.92 Ω
 Zero sequence impedance=2.6100+j29.8858 Ω
III. Source impedance: (Source 2)
 Positive sequence impedance=0.87+j9.96 Ω
 Zero sequence impedance=1.3050+j14.9400 Ω
IV. Transmission line parameters (per km).
 Positive sequence impedance=0.0256+j0.3670 Ω
 Zero sequence impedance=0.1362+j1.1096 Ω
V. Sampling Time: 1 millisecond.
VI. Line Length: 128 km.

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BIOGRAPHIES OF AUTHORS

Received the B.Tech in Electrical Engineering from BPUT and M.Tech degrees from SOA
University in 2011 and 2014 respectively. He is currently working towards the Ph.D degree at
SOA Demmed University. His research interest are Power System Protection and Power System
Transients.

Received the B.Sc(Engg), M.E in Electrical engineering from Sambalpur University and Ph.D
from KIIT University in 1990, 1997 and 2017 respectively. He is currently an associate professor
in the department of electrical engineering at SOA Demmed University. His research area includes
Power System Protection and Power System Transients.

Received the B.Sc(Engg), M.Sc(Engg) and Ph.D degrees in Electrical Engineering from
Sambalpur University in 1970, 1973 and 1980 respectively. He is currently a professor in the
department of electrical engineering at SOA Demmed University. His research area includes
Power System Protection and Power System Operation and Control.

Transient Monitoring Function Based Fault Classifier for Relaying Applications (P. R. Pattanaik)