International Journal of Advanced Computational Engineering and Networking, ISSN: 2320-2106, Volume-3, Issue-9, Sept.

-2015

DEVELOPMENT OF DISTANCE RELAY IN MATLAB

1
JAYANT LAMTURE, 2A. P. VAIDYA
1
PG Student, 2Professor, Electrical Engineering Department,
Walchand college of Engineering Sangli,
E-mail: 1jayantlam25@gmail.com, 2anil.vaidya@walchandsangli.ac.in

Abstract — Distance relays perform a key role in the protection of transmission lines. This paper explains the modelling of
distance relay using Matlab/Simulink package. Sim Power System toolbox was used for detailed modelling of distance relay,
transmission line and fault simulation. Inside the modelling, single line to ground (SLG) fault was choose to be the fault type
and Mho type distance characteristic was choose to be as the protection scheme sheet

Keywords— Distance Relay; Matlab/Simulink; Single Line to Ground; Mho Distance Protection.

I. INTRODUCTION if the fault is inside or outside the protected zone.

Protection relays are among main components in
power systems which can give very high impact on
power system’s stability and reliability. One of the
protection relays used in power system is distance or
impedance relay which is mainly used in transmission
system. Distance relay can be used as main or backup
protection. It can be used to protect the transmission
line or power transformer. Nowadays, numerical
distance relays have been used widely replacing the
electromechanical and static distance relays. The
understanding on the operation of distance relay is
quite difficult compared to other protection relays
because of its complex theories and philosophies.
A. Distance Protection Scheme
Fig. 1 shows the basic distance protection scheme of a
transmission line. The impedance measurement inputs
are the values of three phase current and voltage
phasors taken from the current transformer (CT) and
voltage transformer (VT) respectively. Three phase
current and voltage waveforms must be filtered first to
eliminate the harmonic contents which may present
due to arcing of the fault.
They immediately release a trip signal when the
impedance value is inside the zone 1 impedance circle
of distance relay [1].
There are many types of distance relay characteristic
such as mho, quadrilateral, reactance, admittance,
polarized-mho, offset mho etc. Every type of
characteristics has different intended function and
theories behind. In this simulation, Mho type distance
relay was used as the distance protection scheme.
Basic Mho distance protection will comprise
instantaneous directional Zone 1 protection and one or
more time delayed zones. Numerical distance relays
may have up to five zones, some set to measure in the
reverse direction. Numerical relays usually have a
reach setting of up to 85% of the protected line
impedance for instantaneous Zone 1 protection. The
resulting 15% safety margin ensures that there is no
risk of the Zone 1 protection over-reaching the
protected line due to errors in the current and voltage
transformers, in accuracies in line impedance data
provided for setting purposes and errors of relay
setting and measurement of the distance protection
must cover the remaining 15% of the line. The reach
setting of the Zone 2 protection should be at least
120% of the protected line impedance. In many
applications it is common practice to set the Zone 2
reach to be equal to the protected line section +50% of
the shortest adjacent line. Zone 3 reach should be set
to at least 1.2 times the impedance presented to the
relay for a fault at the remote end of the second line
section (GEC, 1990). Typical reach for a 3-zone
distance protection are shown in Figure 2

Figure 1. Basic distance protection scheme

The filtered waveforms then sampled at a selected

sampling frequency before being used digitally inside
distance relay. The relays compare the setting
impedance with the measured impedance to determine Figure. 2. Mho type distance characteristic

Development Of Distance Relay In Matlab

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 International Journal of Advanced Computational Engineering and Networking, ISSN: 2320-2106,
Where, AB- Protected line
θ- Line angle
AP- Impedance setting
B. Fault Calculation Algorithms
A fault in power system can be classified into
symmetrical or unsymmetrical faults. Three phase
fault is the only symmetrical fault where all phases are
in contact with each other. The line to line (LL) fault,
double line to ground (DLG) fault and single line to
ground (SLG) fault are classified as unsymmetrical
faults [2]. Basically, when a fault occurs at a
transmission line, distance relay measures the
impedance between the faulty phases in case of LL
fault or between faulty phases and neutral conductor
in case of ground faults. Table 1 show the different
algorithm used to measure the fault impedance for
different types of fault [3]. Distance relay will first
determined the fault type by using internal phase
selection feature and then determine which impedance
measurement algorithm must be used.
TABLE I. FAULT IMPEDANCE ALGORITHM
FOR DIFFERENT FAULT TYPES
Where;
A, B and C indicates faulty phases.
G indicates ground fault.
VA, VB and VC indicate voltage phasors
IA, IB and IC indicate current phasors
Z0 = line zero-sequence impedance
Z1 = line positive-sequence impedance
k0 = residual compensation factor where k0 = (Z0-
Z1)/kZ1.
K can be 1 or 3 depend on the relay design.
II. MODELING TRANSMISSION LINE AND
DISTANCE RELAY
Matlab is powerful analysis software which has the
capability of modeling power system components
using Sim Power Systems toolbox inside Simulink
package. In this toolbox, many available power
systems components such as three-phase transformer,
three-phase load, distributed parameters line, three-
phase source, circuit breaker etc. can be used for AC
or DC applications [4]. All these components are
ready to use where the users should only drag the
components into model file and enter the parameter
values.
Development Of Distance Relay In Matlab
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Volume-3, Issue-9, Sept.-2015
Figure. 3. One-line diagram of transmission line with three-
phase load
Fig. 3 shows the one-line diagram of a spur
transmission line connecting to a three-phase load
which was used in this modeling. The transmission
line and load was modeled using distributed
parameters line and three-phase load block sets
respectively. Fig. 4 shows the developed model of
transmission line and load. From Fig. 4, it can be seen
that the transmission line was separated into two equal
lines. The reason is to simulate a fault at a point along
the transmission line where the first line simulate the
fault distance from the substation terminal until fault
point while the second line simulate the balance
distance from fault point until the end of the
transmission line. Table 2 shows the ‘default’ power
system, transmission line and load data used in this
simulation.
As discussed earlier, the fault impedance
measurement requires the post-fault three phase
current and voltage phasors. The three phase current
and voltage waveforms extracted from the CT and VT
respectively need to be filtered first which is done by
the Low pass Filter block set. Then, the only remained
fundamental voltage and current waveforms will be
passed to Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) block set. The
function of FFT block set is to extract the magnitudes
and phase angles of fundamental three phase current
and voltage phasors. The FFT block set performs a
Fourier analysis of the input signal over a running
window of one cycle of the fundamental frequency of
the signal. These magnitudes and phase angles then
are used by the SLG Fault Calculation block set to
calculate the impedance of the faulted phase before
the occurrence of fault until the fault is cleared. The
outputs of this block set are the magnitudes and phase
angles of impedance, the values of resistance and the
values of reactance. All these data are calculated
before the occurrence of fault until the fault is cleared.
Figure. 4. Transmission line and load model.
International Journal of Advanced Computational Engineering and Networking, ISSN: 2320-2106, Volume-3, Issue-9, Sept.-2015

TABLE II. POWER SYSTEM, III. SIMULATION AND RESULTS

TRANSMISSION LINE AND LOAD

Figure 6. Overall Simulation Model

Figure 6 shows the overall simulation model including

the basic power system, transmission line model and
load with developed distance relay has been
implemented to it. Circuit is simulated for various
faults such as SLG, LL, LLG, LLL and LLLG at
various distances from substation so that distance
relay will sense the fault in its various zones according
to the impedance setting.
Results are shown below for SLG fault. Current and
voltage waveforms at relay during the same are given
in figure 7.

1000
Ir
Ib
500 Iy
Curren t in A

-500

-1000
0 5000 10000 15000
Time in microseconds

5
x 10
1
Vr
Vy
0.5 Vb
Voltag e in V olts

-0.5

-1
0 5000 10000 15000
Time in microseconds

Figure 7. Current and Voltage waveforms at relay during

SLG(R) fault

Fig. 8 & 9 show the fault impedance locus for fault at

20 km and 49 km from the substation terminal
respectively. The setting for zone 1 and zone 2 is 80
percent and 120 percent of line length or equal to 40
km and 60 km respectively. It can be seen that the
final point of fault impedance locus for fault at 20 km
falls under zone 1 characteristic while it falls between
zone 1 and zone 2 characteristics for fault at 49 km
from substation terminal.

150

100

50
Reactan ce in Ohm

-50

-100

-300 -200 -100 0 100 200 300

Resistance in Ohm

Figure 5. Block diagram of the developed distance relay model Figure 7. Estimated fault impedance locus during SLG fault on
R phase in Zone 1

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 International Journal of Advanced Computational Engineering and Networking, ISSN: 2320-2106, Volume-3, Issue-9, Sept.-2015
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other types of distance relay characteristic and fault
80
types.
60

40
REFERENCES
20
Re a c ta n c e in Oh m

0
[1] Abdlmnam A. Abdlrahem and Hamid H Sherwali, “Modeling
-20
of numerical distance relays using Matlab”, IEEE
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-60 (ISIEA 2009), October 4-6, 2009, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
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[2] Hadi Saadat, “Power system analysis”, 3rd Edition, PSA
Publishing, ISBN 0984543805, 9780984543809
-100
[3] L. C. Wu, C. W. Liu and C. S. Chen, “Modeling and testing
-120
-300 -200 -100 0 100 200 300 of a digital distance relay using Matlab/Simulink”, IEEE
Resistance in Ohm
2005.
Figure 8.Estimated fault impedance locus during SLG fault on [4] The Math Works, Inc., “SimPowerSystems user’s guide”,
R phase in Zone 2 Version 4.6, 2008.
[5] The Math Works, Inc., “GUIDE quick start”, 2008.
CONCLUSION [6] M. H. Idris, S. Hardi and M. Z. Hassan, “Teaching Distance
Relay Using Matlab/Simulink Graphical User Interface”,
Malaysian Technical Universities Conference on Engineering
A Matlab based distance relay was successfully and Technology, November 2012.
developed and presented. So, we are able of changing [7] Anderson. P.M.”Power System Protection”, ISBN 0-07-
simulation parameters such as power system data, 134323-7 McGraw-Hill, 1999
transmission line data, load data and fault data and [8] IEEE Guide for Protective Relay Applications to
Transmission Lines,IEEE Standard C37.113, 1999
observe their effects on fault impedance locus. For [9] Sim Power Systems Toolbox Ver. 5.1, for Use with Simulink,
future enhancement, the model can be extended for User’s Guide 2009. Natick, MA: Math Works, Inc.

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