International Journal of Power and Energy Systems, Vol. 23, No.

3, 2003

DESIGN PARAMETERS OF HV TESTING

STATION AT QATRANA SUBSTATION
H. Obeid∗

Abstract The applied voltage to the primary winding of the voltage

regulator (VR) is phase-to-phase voltage (380 V).
This article presents the procedure implemented to calculate The voltage applied to the terminals of control system
the design parameters of High-Voltage Pollution Testing Center and instrumentation is single-phase 220 V. In this regard
(HVPTC) at Qatrana substation. These parameters were correctly
there are two possibilities of maintaining that voltage:
defined and verified based on manufacturer’s data in order to
construct a testing facility for the investigation of contaminated 1. From the LV side of the PT (Fig. 1).
insulators. A short-circuit current was evaluated to comply with the
existing regulations in this field.

Key Words

High voltage, testing, pollution, leakage current, Jordan

1. Introduction

The High-Voltage Pollution Testing Center (HVPTC) was

designed to test various types of insulator strings for high-
voltage (HV) transmission lines under natural pollution
conditions. The objectives of these investigations are:
1. to determine the severity of site conditions, which
represents the desert in terms of type and degree of
pollution;
2. to maintain the proper insulation level of HV trans-
mission lines (types and number of insulators per
string);
3. to accumulate information about the pollution of insu-
lators, which will be used in the future to calculate the
probability of flashover and the risk of failure of HV
transmission line insulation.
Figure 1. Power supply from LV side.
In this case, the control system and measuring equip-
ment may be affected when high leakage current appears on
the surface of the polluted insulators before flashover. To
avoid that, a shielding transformer seems to be necessary
to separate the control system and measuring equipment
from the test circuit.
2. The other possibility is to feed the control desk and
measuring equipment from the HV side of PT through
pole-mounted transformer 33/0.4 kV (Fig. 2).

2. Power Supply

The HVPTC is located at Qatrana substation (south of

Amman) and is connected to 33 kV busbar at substation by
350 m power cable through 33/0.4 kV; 100 kVA, delta–star
connected, transformer.
The measuring and control equipment is connected
to low-voltage (LV) side of the power transformer (PT).
∗ Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Applied Figure 2. Power supply from HV side.
Sciences University, Amman, Jordan; e-mail: Hobeid50@yahoo.
com In this case, two phases of the LV side of PT are loaded
(paper no. 203-3249) and the other one will be open circuit.
168
 The technical data of the PT is as follows:
Connection: delta–star
Apparent power: S = 100 kVA
Impedance voltage: UZ% = 5.5%
Active component of impedance voltage: UR% =
0.081% (estimated value)
Reactive component of impedance voltage: UX% =
5.4994%
Single-phase short-circuit level at 33 kV busbar at
Qatrana substation is: Ssc = 87 MVA
3. Characteristics and Parameters
of HV Equipment
The most important HV equipment in the testing cir-
cuit is the HV transformer and the VR. The parameters
of HV testing transformer (TT) are primary voltage up
to 0.380 kV, secondary voltage up to 350 kV, apparent
power STT = 700 kVA, impedance voltage UZ% = 14.75%,
active component of impedance voltage UR% = 1.02%, and
reactive component of impedance voltage UX% = 14.71%.
The primary winding of TT consists of two windings,
and this construction permits the connection of these two
windings in series or in parallel. In each case we obtain
different transformation ratio and values of HV side of
the transformer. For series connection (Fig. 3) the rated
transformation ratio n will be equal to 460. The value of
the HV side is 175 kV.
In the case of parallel connection of primary windings
(Fig. 4), the nominal transformation ratio is equal to 921
and the value of voltage at HV side of TT will be 350 kV,
and this is the maximum voltage that might be obtained
from the TT.
In some cases it is required to change the value of the
applied voltage to the terminals of primary windings of HV
TT, and this can be done by means of VR. In case of series
Figure 3. Series connection of primary winding.
Figure 4. Parallel connection of primary winding.
169
connection of primary windings of HV HT VHV = 101.2 kV,
and 202.2 kV in the case of parallel connection.
3.1 Voltage Regulator
The primary winding of the VR is connected to line voltage,
and the voltage at the secondary winding may be changed
in the range of 0–0.38 kV; this winding is connected to the
terminals of primary windings of HV TT. The power of
VR is equal to 700 kVA.
The most important characteristics of VR are the
variation of its power and voltage impedance during the
process of regulation.
Table 1 shows the values of power and voltage
impedance of VR when the voltage is changed from 100%
to 13%.
It is necessary to point out here that the variation
of impedance of VR will affect the value of short-circuit
current of the testing circuit.
Table 2 and Fig. 5 show the value of short-circuit
current of the regulator with the variation of voltage at the
terminals of secondary winding of the VR.
Table 2 and Fig. 5 show that the process of voltage
regulation is accepted in the range of 100–45%. As the
voltage decreases, the short-circuit current increases and
will reach its maximum value when the voltage at the
terminal of the secondary winding is equal to 54% of its
nominal value, and this is very important in pollution tests.
When the VR is operated with HV TT, the variation of
short-circuit current at HV side of TT during the process
of voltage regulation is shown in Table 3.
4. Short-Circuit Current Calculation
In HV testing techniques, the short-circuit current must
be calculated for any testing circuit. As an example, when
the testing object is short circuited due to flashover, the
short-circuit current will cause a voltage drop, which will
affect the actual value of the HV that has been applied to
the test equipment.
In pollution testing, when the surface of insulator is
clean (for natural pollution this is the case at the beginning
of the test), the value of leakage current will be very small
(about a few milliamperes), and therefore the associated
voltage drop is negligible. It has been found that the surface
impedance of an individual unit, as the moisture condition
progresses, is reduced and changed from capacitive at the
beginning of the test to resistive when the sallination
activity appeared. This means that the value of leakage
current will be of high amplitude before flashover, and
will be raised very much during flashover. Therefore, the
testing voltage will be distorted due to voltage drop in
these conditions.
4.1 Testing Circuit
The testing circuit for the main case is depicted in Fig. 6.
In this case the value of voltage at the terminals of HV
 Table 1
Values of Voltage Impedance during Regulation

Voltage Voltage Apparent Impedance Active Reactive

V (V) Regulation V (%) Power* S (kVA) Voltage* (Z% ) Component* (R) Component* (X)
380 100 700 5.7 6.9 7.2
205 54 378 5.1 3.2 3.4
141 37 259 10.1 4.5 4.7
87 23 161 20.0 5.6 5.8
49 13 91 43.0 6.8 7.0
∗ These are measured values during testing of VR.

Table 2 Table 3
Values of Short-Circuit Current during Effect of Voltage Regulation on Short-Circuit
Regulation Current of HV Side of TT

Voltage Regulation Short-Circuit Current Voltage Regulation* Short-Circuit Current**

V (%) Isc (%) V (%) Isc (%)

100 100 100 100

90 101 90 80

80 101 70 77

70 103 65 72.5

60 109 54 62

54 113 37 40

50 111 23 23
∗ 100% of voltage corresponds to 380 V and 100% of
45 100
short-circuit current corresponds to 32317.6 A.
∗∗ I
40 65 sc is the short-circuit current at the HV winding of
TT when it is connected in series with VR in testing
30 40 circuit.

20 22
Note: 100% of voltage corresponds to 380 V and 100%
of short-circuit current corresponds to 32317.6 A.

Figure 6. Testing circuit.

and the applied voltage is equal to 380 V. In this case the

testing object is subjected to 350 kV at the HV side of TT.

Figure 5. Short-circuit current as a function of voltage at 4.2 Short-Circuit Calculation

the terminal of VR.
winding of TT is equal to 350 kV, and the applied voltage
to the primary winding of VR is phase-to-phase voltage
(380 V) and is taken from two phases of 33/0.38 kV PT.
The primary windings of TT are connected in parallel,
170
The equivalent circuit for short-circuit current calculation
is shown in Fig. 7.
The reactance of the source in ohms referred to 33 kV
side is equal to 12.52 Ω; the resistance and reactance of
PT in ohms referred to 380 V side are equal to 0.0012 and
 current delivered by the transformer, if the test object is
short circuited at the test voltage, is not less than 1 A rms.
Expectations for requirement on steady-state short-
circuit current are:

• For dry tests on small samples of solid insulation,

Figure 7. Equivalent circuit of the testing circuit.
0.008 Ω, respectively. The resistance and reactance of VR
at full voltage are equal to 6,900 and 7,200 Ω, respectively.
All parameters of the circuit are referred to 33 kV side
and expressed in per units (pu).
The total resistance and reactance of the short-
circuited circuit are equal, respectively, to 0.0554 and
0.2349 pu, and the R/X ratio is equal to 0.2358 pu. The
short-circuit current is equal to 4.14 pu, which is equivalent
to 8.28 A. The reactance in ohms per phase is equal to
42.3 kΩ.
The most important condition for pollution tests is the
maximum permissible voltage drop caused by the leakage
current pulse occurring during the whole test. In order to
have consistent and comparable results on all insulators,
the test circuit must fulfil the condition that the voltage
drop during the whole test does not exceed 5% [1]. Then
the voltage drop for our test circuit may be calculated by
the following formula [2]:
s !
I R/X I2 1 plant at the test voltage depends on the ratio resistance/
∆V % = 1 + − 1− 2
Isc 1 + (R2 /X 2 )
p
Isc 1 + (R2 /X 2 )
The voltage drop in our test circuit is 3.5%, which is
consistent with the above-mentioned requirements.
5. IEC Recommendations for Pollution Test
insulating liquids, or combinations of the two, a short-
circuit current of the order of 1 A rms may suffice;
• For tests under artificial pollution, the required short-
circuit current depends on the ratio of series resistance
Rs to the steady-state reactance Xs of the voltage
source, including the generator or supply network at
the test frequency (Table 4).
Table 4
Effect of Source Impedance
on Short-Circuit Current
Rs /Xs 0.1 0.1–0.2 0.2–0.3
Isc (A rms) 6 8 12
In IEC publication 507 [4] the requirement for test
voltage is defined as:
Throughout the test, the insulator shall be contin-
uously energized at the specified test voltage which
generally is the highest line to earth voltage of the sys-
tem in which the insulator is to be used. The frequency
shall lie between 48 Hz and 62 Hz.
The minimum short-circuit current of the testing
reactance (R/X) of the test voltage source. Table 5 gives
the limits of the short-circuit current of the testing plant
(Isc ) that are recommended for different values of R/X.
Table 5
Minimum Short-Circuit Current
as a Function of R/X Ratio

At the present time there are two IEC recommendations R/X Minimum
regarding pollution test:
Salt Fog Solid Layer Short Circuit
1. HV test technique, Part 2: test procedure publication Current (A)
Method Method
60-2, 1973
2. Artificial pollution tests on high-voltage insulators to 0.05 0.05 5
be used on AC systems, publication 507, 1975 0.05–0.15 0.05–0.15 7
The first recommendation defines the requirements for 0.15–0.5 0.15–0.3 10
the transformer test circuit as:
0.5–1.5 0.3–0.5 15
The voltage in the test circuit should be stable enough
to be practically unaffected by varying leakage cur-
Various HV laboratories all over the world have dif-
rents. Partial discharges, or pre-discharges in the test
ferent voltage source characteristics. Table 6 shows the
object, should not reduce the test voltage to such an
voltage source characteristics of some testing facilities [5].
extent and for such a time that the measured disrup-
It should be noted here that the above-mentioned
tive discharge voltage of the test object is affected [3].
recommendations, which were in effect in the 1980s, are
This is usually achieved if, simultaneously, (1) the total not sufficient. It is more accurate to relate the creepage
capacitance of the test object and any additional capacitor distance (mm/kV) to short-circuit current of the testing
is not less than about 1000 pF; and (2) the steady-state circuit. Table 7 shows this relationship.
171
 Table 6
Voltage Source Characteristics of Some Testing Facilities

Laboratory Voltage Source Characteristics

Nominal Nominal Short- R/X
Voltage Circuit Current
(kV) (A)
Bonneville Power 290 18 0.36
administration
Ceraver 250 18 0.5 Figure 8. Direct connection of two earthing systems.
ENEL 350 50 0.5
6.1 Ground Resistivity at Qatrana Substation
Institute de recherche 200 43 0.2
d’Hydro Quebec Ground resistivity at Qatrana substation (at the site of
Lapp Insulator 500 23 – HV PTC) was measured during May. Four measurements
were performed at various points, and the average value of
NGK Insulator 200 11 0.1 resistivity was found to be equal to 30 Ω m.
The earthing system of HVPTC will consist of two
Ohio Brass Co. 250 16 –
parts:
Ontario Hydro 350 23 0.51
• Direct connection to earthing system of 132/33 kV
Project UHV 150 22 1.78 substation
• Earthing mesh at HVPTC
University of Southern 50 4 –
California To avoid the rise of potential in HVPTC due to faults
in 132/33 kV system, a direct and reliable connection must
be maintained between the two earthing systems through
(1) the sheath of the power cable and (2) two strips of
Table 7
copper, the cross-sectional area of which must be not less
Relationship between
than 95 mm2 each (Fig. 8).
Leakage Distance to
Short-Circuit Current
6.2 Earthing Mesh
Leakage Path Short-Circuit
(mm/kV) Current (A) At HVPTC earth mesh consists of horizontally laid copper
strips as shown in Fig. 8, the cross-sectional area is 95 mm2 ,
16 6
and the contact area between the equipment and the earth
20 9 mesh must not be less than 200 mm2 . The strips must
be laid at 800 mm below the surface of the ground. The
25 12–15
earth resistance of this mesh was calculated and is equal to
31 18–21 0.37 Ω.

6.3 Control of Voltage Gradients

outside the Fence
6. Earthing System
The HVPTC will be protected by means of a metallic
Earthing, fencing, and shielding are very important factors
fence. In this case, the potential outside the metallic fence
in HV facilities and are intended to prevent risk to persons,
during ground faults should be controlled. The best way of
installations, and apparatus. The main function of earthing
reducing the value of this potential is to put a horizontal
systems is to provide safety for the working personnel
copper strip 1 m outside the fence at 1.5 m below the
during ground faults and to protect equipment; therefore,
ground level.
step and touch voltages must be kept at acceptable limits
In HVPTC all tests will be carried out at power fre-
during ground faults.
quency voltage, and it is not necessary to take precautions
For HV substation, standards indicated that the earth-
and protection against impulse voltage.
ing resistance must be less than 0.5 Ω. Some standards
indicate that step and touch voltages must be less than
250 V for clearing time of ground faults less than or equal 7. Measuring the Leakage Current
to 0.5 s. Therefore, step and touch voltages should be kept
less than 125 V for clearing time of ground faults in the There are several methods, in pollution tests, for measuring
range of 0.5–1.0 s. site severity. One of these methods is the leakage current
172
method. The essence of the method is to measure, for a
given insulator, by means of laboratory test, the highest
leakage current as a function of the pollution severity at a
given applied voltage. Usually, the criteria for dimensioning
insulation for a polluting environment are based on the
recording of highest leakage current peak [6]. Two types of
measurements must be available:
• a measure of the value of leakage current during the
test;
• a count of the number of leakage current pulses above
a specific value.
The measuring and recording equipment at the Center
was initially capable of recording and measuring the value
of leakage current in the range of microamperes up to
0.5 A. Taking into account that the leakage current may
reach high values, certain modifications were made. The
shunt in the measuring system was changed in order to
make possible the measuring of leakage currents of various
amplitudes. The measuring range will be 2, 20, 200, and
2,000 mA. The step in the above-mentioned range is 10 due
to the construction of the measuring system.
Also, to protect the shunts from pollution and atmo-
spheric condition, waterproof boxes of steel sheet covered
with hinge opening and age-resisting gaskets were installed.
Each box will contain four shunt resistances with the nec-
essary outputs and inputs for measuring cables. The pulse
counters were installed latter.
8. Conclusion
1. HVPTC is connected to 33 kV busbar of Qatrana
substation through 350 m of cable and 33/0.38 kV
three-phase PT. The operating voltage of control sys-
tem and measuring devices is 220 V; they are separated
from the testing circuit by means of shielding trans-
former, which is mounted in the control desk. Control
system and measuring devices are connected to LV
side of PT through distribution board with 2,000 A
isolator.
2. Characteristics and parameters of all HV equipment
were correctly defined based on information and test
results obtained from the manufacturer. The construc-
tion of HV TT’s permits one to obtain two main values
of transformation ratios depending on the connection
of HV TT primary windings.
3. The characteristics of VR show that the process
of voltage regulating is accepted in the range of
173
171–380 V. In this range the effect of the impedance
of VR on the short-circuit current of the test is small.
4. It is recommended that the leakage distance (path) per
kilovolt of system voltage be related to the short-circuit
current of testing circuit.
5. The earthing system for HVPTC consists mainly of
95 mm2 copper strips installed at 800 mm below ground
level. The centre is surrounded by copper strips at
1.5 m below ground level to control the potential
outside the metallic fence.
6. As the proposed measuring equipment is capable of
measuring and recording leakage currents of very low
values, some modifications were suggested so as to
extend the range of measuring values from 2 mA up
to 2,000 mA; the intermediate values are 20 mA and
200 mA.
References
[1] M.P. Verma, Test circuit data for pollution tests, Forschungs-
Gemeinschaft Fur Hochspannungs Und Hochstromtecchnik E.V.
[2] I. Kolossa, Zusammenhaenge zwischen den Fremdschichueber-
schlag nanhgebenden Kenngroessen von Hochspannungsanla-
gen, Teil 1 und 2, Archiv fuer technisches Messen, Blatt Z
734-3 u. Dez.
[3] High voltage test procedure technique, part 2, Test procedure
publication 60-2, 1973.
[4] IEC Publication 507, Artificial pollution tests on high voltage
insulators to be used on ac systems, 1975.
[5] The AC clean fog test for contaminated insulators, Prepared
by the task force members on testing IEEE insulators, IEEE
working group on insulator contamination, lightning and insu-
lator subcommittee, IEEE Transactions on Power Apparatus
and Systems, PAS-102 (3), 1983.
[6] J. Riubrugent et al., Design of external insulation for pollution
withstand based on “in situ
measurements of leakage current,
CIGRE Symp., Stockholm, 1981.
Biography
Hani Obeid received his M.Sc.
and Ph.D. degrees in power
systems and networks from
Leningrad Polytechnic Institute in
1974 and 1980, respectively. He is
the author or co-author of eight
technical books. He is a Senior
Member of IEEE, PE. Currently
he is with Applied Sciences Uni-
versity in Amman and at the same
time is a Technical Advisor to a number of consulting firms
in Jordan and Saudi Arabia.