Accurate and economical traveling-wave fault locating without communications

Abstract

This paper describes a single-ended traveling-wave-based fault-locating method that works with currents only. Unlike current transformers, coupling-capacitor voltage transformers do not have a frequency bandwidth that is wide enough to allow measuring of voltage traveling waves for this application. The key to a robust single-ended traveling-wave fault-locating method is to correctly identify reflections from the fault point. For this purpose, the method uses additional information, such as the impedance-based fault location and reflections from the remote terminal and external network elements. This paper presents the single-ended traveling-wave-based fault-locating method in detail and explains how to perform fault locating manually using ultra-high-resolution fault records from any recording device. This paper also presents laboratory test results as well as field cases in which line crews found the actual faults.