Operations-Training-Solutions

The focus of O-T-S is the development and delivery of training programs for electric
power system operations personnel.

Southwest 2011 Outage

The Dynamics of Disturbances class has been updated to include a detailed description of the
9/8/2011 Southwest outage.

NERC Practice Tests

Synchronizing and Synchronizing Equipment

1. Synchronizing and Synchronizing Equipment
1.1 Theory of Synchronizing
When closing a circuit breaker between two energized parts of the power system, it is crucial to
match voltages on both sides of the circuit breaker before closing. If this matching or
"synchronizing" process is not done correctly, a power system disturbance will result and
equipment (including generators) can be damaged. In order to synchronize properly, three
different aspects of the voltage across the circuit breaker must be closely monitored. The three
aspects of the voltage are called the synchronizing variables and are:
1. The voltage magnitudes
2. The frequency of the voltages
3. The phase angle difference between the voltages
1.1.1 Voltage Magnitude Synchronizing Variable
If the voltage magnitudes are not closely matched, a sudden rise in Mvar flow will appear across
the circuit breaker as it is closed. For example, if a 345 kV circuit breaker were closed with a 20

kV difference in voltage across the open circuit breaker, a large Mvar flow would suddenly occur
upon closing. The allowable voltage magnitude differences across the open circuit breaker are
system specific. However, for general guidance, a difference of a few percent is unlikely to cause
any serious problem.
1.1.2 Frequency Synchronizing Variable
If the frequencies on either side of an open circuit breaker are not matched prior to closing, a
sudden change in MW flow will appear across the circuit breaker as it is closed. The sudden MW
flow change is in response to the initial frequency difference as the system seeks to establish a
common frequency once the circuit breaker is closed. The allowable frequency difference is again
system specific. However, a general guideline would be to have the frequencies within 0.1 Hz of
each other prior to closing.
1.1.3 Phase Angle Synchronizing Variable
The third synchronizing variable - and likely the most important of the three - is the voltage phase
angle difference. If the phase difference between the voltages on either side of the open circuit
breaker is not reduced to a small value, a large MW flow increase will suddenly occur once the
circuit breaker is closed. The voltage phase angle difference is the difference between the zero
crossings of the voltages on either side of the open circuit breaker. Ideally, the voltage phase
angle should be as close to zero degrees as possible before closing the circuit breaker.
1.2 Synchronizing Examples
The importance of synchronizing cannot be overstated. All system operators should understand the
theory and practice of synchronizing. If two power systems are synchronized via an open circuit
breaker, and the synchronizing process is not done correctly, generators can be severely damaged.
Two scenarios for synchronizing follow to further describe the synchronizing process.
1.2.1 Scenario #1: Synchronizing Two Islands
The first scenario assumes that two islands are about to be connected together using the open
circuit breaker as illustrated in Figure 1. The two islands, since they are independent electrical
systems, will have different frequencies so all three of the synchronizing variables must be
monitored to ensure they are within acceptable limits prior to closing the open circuit breaker.
The system operators for the two islands will likely have to adjust generator MW output levels (or
adjust island load magnitudes) in one or both islands to achieve the desired adjustment in
frequencies and phase angles. Voltage control equipment (reactors, capacitors, etc.) may also be
used as necessary to change voltage magnitudes to within acceptable levels.

Figure 1
Synchronizing Two Islands
1.2.2 Scenario #2: Establishing the Second Tie
Once the first transmission line is closed interconnecting the two islands, the frequency will be
the same in the two areas. Therefore, one of the three synchronizing variables (the frequency) is
no longer a factor. However, as illustrated in Figure 2, the other two synchronizing variables must
still be monitored. Generation and/or voltage control equipment may be to be utilized to ensure
the phase angle and voltage magnitude differences are within acceptable limits prior to closing
the second circuit breaker. This process should be easier than closing the first transmission line
(Scenario #1) as frequency is no longer a factor.

Figure 2
Establishing the Second Transmission Tie

1.3 Synchronizing Equipment

1.3.1 Synchroscope
A synchroscope is a simple piece of equipment that is used to monitor the three synchronizing
variables. A basic synchroscope (illustrated in Figure 3) inputs voltage waveforms from the two
sides of the open circuit breaker. If the voltage waveforms are at the same frequency, the
synchroscope does not rotate. If the voltage waveforms are at a different frequency, the
synchroscope rotates in proportion to the frequency difference. The synchroscope needle always
points to the voltage phase angle difference.
A synchroscope is a manual device in that an operator must be watching the "scope" to ensure they
close the circuit breaker at the correct time. The synchroscope is normally mounted above eye
level on a "synch panel". The synch panel also contains two voltmeters so that the voltage
magnitudes can be simultaneously compared.
The synchroscope in Figure 3 reflects a slight voltage magnitude mismatch, and a stationary
synchroscope with a phase angle of approximately 35. The fact that the synchroscope needle is
not rotating indicates frequency is the same on either side of the circuit breaker.

Figure 3
Synchroscope in a Synch Panel

1.3.2 Synchro-Check Relays

A synchro-check or synch-check relay electrically determines if the difference in voltage
magnitude, frequency and phase angle falls within allowable limits. The allowable limits will vary
with the location on the power system. Typically, the further away from generation and load, the
more phase angle difference can be tolerated. Synch-check relays typically do not provide
indication of the voltage magnitude, frequency or phase angle. A synch-check relay decides
internally whether its conditions for closing are satisfied. The synch-check relay will either allow
or prevent closing depending on its settings. A typical synch-check relay may allow closing if the
voltage angle across the breaker is less than 30.
1.3.3 Application of Synchronizing Equipment
At power plants, synchroscopes are routinely installed to permit manual closing of a circuit
breaker. In addition, synch-check relays can be used to "supervise" the closing of the circuit
breaker and prevent distracted or inexperienced operator from initiating a bad close.
Modern power plants typically utilize automatic synchronizers. Automatic synchronizers send
pulses to the generator exciter and governor to change the voltage and frequency of the unit. The
synchronizer will automatically close the breaker when it is within an allowable window.
Substations on the transmission system have traditionally had synchroscopes installed. However,
few substations are now manned due to the availability of powerful SCADA systems. Because of
this development, newer substations may or may not have a synch panel, depending on the
transmission company procedures. Since most circuit breaker operations are done remotely,
transmission companies often rely on synch-check relays to supervise closing of breakers.
Figure 4 illustrates a possible synchronizing system for substation breakers. Note the use of a
synch scope and a synch-check relay. Electrical contacts can be opened or closed to rearrange the
synchronizing system as desired.

Figure 4
Synchronizing System for a Substation Breaker

Operations-Training-Solutions
The focus of O-T-S is the development and delivery of training programs for electric
power system operations personnel.

Southwest 2011 Outage

The Dynamics of Disturbances class has been updated to include a detailed description of the
9/8/2011 Southwest outage.

NERC Practice Tests

Surge Impedance Loading (SIL)

The surge impedance loading or SIL of a transmission line is the MW loading of a transmission line
at which a natural reactive power balance occurs. The following brief article will explain the
concept of SIL.
Transmission lines produce reactive power (Mvar) due to their natural capacitance. The amount of
Mvar produced is dependent on the transmission line's capacitive reactance (XC) and the voltage
(kV) at which the line is energized. In equation form the Mvar produced is:

Transmission lines also utilize reactive power to support their magnetic fields. The magnetic field
strength is dependent on the magnitude of the current flow in the line and the line's natural
inductive reactance (XL). It follows then that the amount of Mvar used by a transmission line is a
function of the current flow and inductive reactance. In equation form the Mvar used by a
transmission line is:

A transmission line's surge impedance loading or SIL is simply the MW loading (at a unity power
factor) at which the line's Mvar usage is equal to the line's Mvar production. In equation form we
can state that the SIL occurs when:

If we take the square root of both sides of the above equation and then substitute in the formulas
for XL (=2pfL) and XC (=1/2pfC) we arrive at:

The term

in the above equation is by definition the "surge impedance. The theoretical

significance of the surge impedance is that if a purely resistive load that is equal to the surge
impedance were connected to the end of a transmission line with no resistance, a voltage surge
introduced to the sending end of the line would be absorbed completely at the receiving end. The
voltage at the receiving end would have the same magnitude as the sending end voltage and
would have a phase angle that is lagging with respect to the sending end by an amount equal to
the time required to travel across the line from sending to receiving end.
The concept of a surge impedance is more readily applied to telecommunication systems than to
power systems. However, we can extend the concept to the power transferred across a
transmission line. The surge impedance loading or SIL (in MW) is equal to the voltage squared (in
kV) divided by the surge impedance (in ohms). In equation form:

.
Note in this formula that the SIL is dependent only on the kV the line is energized at and the line's
surge impedance. The line length is not a factor in the SIL or surge impedance calculations.
Therefore the SIL is not a measure of a transmission line's power transfer capability as it does not
take into account the line's length nor does it consider the strength of the local power system.
The value of the SIL to a system operator is realizing that when a line is loaded above its SIL it
acts like a shunt reactor - absorbing Mvar from the system - and when a line is loaded below its SIL
it acts like a shunt capacitor - supplying Mvar to the system.
Figure 1 is a graphic illustration of the concept of SIL. This particular line has a SIL of 450 MW.
Therefore is the line is loaded to 450 MW (with no Mvar) flow, the Mvar produced by the line will
exactly balance the Mvar used by the line.

Figure 1
Surge Impedance Loading of a Transmission Loading
.

Power Plant Infromation

Friday, 10 January 2014

Circuit Breaker Logic Circuit in Power plant

Circuit Breaker Logic Circuit in Power Plant

Circuit breakers are geographically distributed in the

power plant to control the power supply to busses or loads
in power plant. So the circuit breakers need to be
controlled from different locations in addition to the
circuit breaker board. The circuit breaker should also
operate for different protection according to their
application. These requirements are full filled using
control logic (Relay logic or PLC) for the circuit breaker
which will initiate close or open signals to the circuit
breaker.
Circuit breaker is latching device i.e. if it is in a closed
position it will be in that position until unless the open
signal is applied to it. So the breaker consists of one closed
coil and trip coil. A required current flow is needed
through the close coil to close the circuit breaker and cause
the breaker to latch the breaker. Once the breaker is closed
the closing coil is de-energized by stopping the current
flow. To trip (open) the circuit breaker, a flow of current is
required through the trip coil. The plunger operated by the
trip coil releases the latch and rapidly opens the breaker.
Once the breaker is open, the trip coil is de-energized.
The logic circuit controls the flow of current to the closed
coil and trip coil according to the logic conditions. Thus
the logic has two paths 1) closed circuit path and 2) trip
(open) circuit path.
Closed Circuit path
This path controls the flow of current to the closed coil
according to the logic switches placed in the path. The

figure shows the closed circuit path for energizing the 52 C

close coil. The path consists of the following parts
Fuse part
A separate fuse is provided in closed path to ensure that if
the fuse in closed circuit blows the breaker still has the
tripping supply to open the breaker.
Breaker closing logic part
This contains the actual logic from the remote or local
close of the circuit breaker. When the Push button from
local or remote logic close is activated then it allows the
current to flow through closing auxiliary relay (52 X). The
auxiliary relay energizes main close coil 52 C. The reason
for placing auxiliary relay is that for energizing the 52 C
coil, it requires large current which the control circuit
cannot tolerate.
Circuit Breaker closing mechanism
By energizing the 52C coil it activates the breaker closing
mechanism. Once the breaker closes the Lb contact which
is mechanically with the circuit breaker closing
mechanism opens the contacts and supply to 52 X
auxiliary relay to de-energize the 52C coil. This is to ensure
that the absence of 52C close coil supply during tripping of
circuit breaker.

Tripping circuit path

The tripping circuit path is separately fused with isolation
from the closing circuit to ensure the reliability of tripping
circuit. The tripping circuit has also three parts as same as
closed circuit.
When the breaker is closed the LB contact in tripping
circuit closed which is in series with trip logic circuit. In
tripping logic in-addition to opening logic from remote
and local, it also consists of protection logic. The
protection logic activates the contact for the specified
protections like over current, earth fault depending on the
application. Once the any of the contact closes then the

current flow will energizes the 52 T coil same as the closing

coil. The tripping energizing operates the plunger and
opens the circuit breaker rapidly.
Posted byRaju Sat03:11
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1 comment:
1.

noddy dane25 March 2014 at 02:24

Valuable information and excellent design you got here! for more details something like visit circuit
breaker types get more informations.
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Sunday, 11 August 2013

What is synchronization and effects of poor

synchronization in power plant

SynchronizationofTurboAlternatororanACgeneratoristhe
process of connecting the generator with grid power supply
which is an interconnection of large pool of generators and
powerconsumptionloads.Simplythegridisparalleloperation
ofsomenumbergeneratorswithsamefrequency.Sotoconnect
the Generator in power plant in this pool of parallel running
generators,Theincominggeneratorparameterslikefrequency,

phaseangleandvoltageshouldbematchingwiththeexisting
gridfrequency.
Beforegoingdetaildescriptionfirstletusunderstandwhatisthe
need of synchronization of generator. Generator is connected
withtheprimemoverwhichprovidestherotatingmagneticfield
andhencethisrotatingmagneticfieldwillinducesthevoltagein
thestationarypart.Thefrequencyandphaseangleofthevoltage
signaliscontrolledbytheprimemoverspeedandmagnitudeof
thevoltagesignaliscontrolledbythegeneratorexcitation.
To understand the phenomenon let us correlate the entire
operationwiththepersonwantstocatcharunningtravelbus.
Considerthetravelbusisgridpowersupplyandthepersonis
incominggenerator.Nowifthepersonwantstogetintothebus
then he should equally or little faster than the bus same the
generatortriesconnecttothegridshouldrunequallyorlittle
faster than the grid. Here the speed is measured with the
frequencybecause speed isproportional tothe frequency( 50
Hz,60Hz).Thepersonisnowrunningwiththesamespeedof
the bus but the bus door is one end of the bus and he is at
anotherendofthebussoheneedstomatchwiththedoortoget
intothebus.Likethesameifthegeneratorisrunningatthe
samefrequencyofgriditcannotbesynchronizeduntilunless
thephaseofthetwovoltagesmatches.
Effectsofpoorsynchronization:

Primemoverdamagesifthespeedandrotorangleisnot
matcheswithgridvoltagefrequencyandphaseangledueto
rapidaccelerationordeceleration.Letussupposegenerator

hastoconnectedtothegridfrequencyof60Hz.Butthe
breaker has closed with poor synchronization at the
generator frequency of 58Hz (i.e for two pole generator
speed is3480 outof 3600rated),now oncethebreaker
closes the generator is connected in the pool of parallel
generatorswhichforcestheincominggeneratortorotateat
thesamegridfrequency.Duetothissuddenaccelerationof
therotorfrom3480to3600rpmandasuddenbreakat
3600rpmdamagestherotormass.Samewayinthereverse
whenthegeneratorisrunninghigherfrequencythanthe
gridfrequency.

AlargecurrentsmaysuddenlyflowthroughtheGenerator
windingsandGeneratortransformerwindingsduetopoor
synchronizationswhichdamagesthewindings.
Therewillbepowerandvoltageoscillationsbecauseofthis
suddenaccelerationanddecelerationoftherotor.
Itmayleadstoactivationofthegeneratorprotectiverelays
whichcausesthemajorinterruptionsotheprocessshould
bestartedonceagainafterclearingtheprotection.

Posted byRaju Sat03:28

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1 comment:
1.

Deepraj Singh16 February 2014 at 01:42

thankyou
Deepraj

very

much,

like

your

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Comments: Nested

Generator Circuit Breaker

02/27/2009 7:06 AM

for one of our project we are using generator

circuit breaker (GCB) instead of station
transformer. GCB is inbetween Gen. Trf and
Generator. So power (generator trf) trfr is back
charged and feeds the Unit aux. tr at starting.
Once the load picksup, GCB is opened and
generator feed the UAT.
At this stage, whether power flow will be in back to
the genertor?
what is the recative implication on genertor with
this procedure?

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V.Amb
arani.
Associate

#1

Re: generator transformer (power transformer)

02/27/2009 8:38 AM

Dear Sir,

Join Date:
Nov 2007
Location:
India
Posts: 41
Good
Answers: 3

Please note that in this case GCB is being used as

synchronisation breaker to synchronise external power source
(say Switchyard bus) and the generator connected to bus
through GSU-Generator step of up transformer.Hence GCB will
be closed during synchronisation and not opened as
stated.Further synchronisation will take place when unitGenerator is connected to external source.Till that time UAT
will be fed from external source.Once synchronisation
takesplace external source and generator get locked and
Generatorwill feed UAT. No back power will flow.The reactive
power willbe as per generator excitation control.
V.Ambarani
======================================
===============================
__________________
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