Typical Reasons of Cable Faults

 Most of them are Third Party and Workmanship Failures

Predominantly caused by Service Contractors
(Man Power & Time issued)

 Main Reasons are

Time Pressure - need to do xx Joints a Day
(mostly caused by Purchase Department of Utilities)
Joint Hole not large enough (not enough Space
for complete Shrinking or accurate Assembling)
Especially in Cities: to much other Cables / Pipes
Climatic Conditions
Not having the Skills / Certificates

1
 Typical Reasons for Cable Faults
 Final Results

2
 Virtual & non-countable Costs
 Servicer failures during normal operation leads to unuasual “Stress“ of whole
Network & could provoke further Cable Faults

Increased Cable Ageing

1. One Phase Breakdown

Higher Voltages at other Phases (1.72 U0)
Faster Growing of other Weak Spots

2. Travelling Waves stimulate the Growth of smaller Weak Spots

3. Higher Current (due to Flashover) strains all components of the Cable

Network
3
Cost Reduction of Penalty Payments
 Total Sum of Costs of Penalty
Payments for the Utilities in the
Netherlands in the Year 2012 was:
 Customers without Energy:
only 26 Minutes

13,3 Million EURO

4
 Different Maintenance Strategies

Source: Technical University of Chemnitz

 Why Condition Based Maintenance?
 Example: Singapore Power Grid

 DAC Technology used to detect & prevent potential Network Failures at

Underground Cables

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 Why testing Cable Installations?
 Why performing Cable Tests on service-aged & new Installations?

 Due to the Regulation of the electricity Market, Reliability of Distribution Networks

becomes more & more important
 With Help from on-site Withstand Tests (to check Voltage Strength) after
Installation or Repair of Failures Failure Rate during normal Operation could be
reduced significantly

Purpose of a Cable Test

 Find existing Weak Spots which are critical for a safe Operation
Break Weak Spots (in the Cable and/or Cable Accessories) down without any
additional negative Influence on the Quality or Ageing of the good Parts of the
Cable
Increasing Reliability
7
Agenda

■ Introduction
■ Acceptance/ commissioning testing
■ Condition Monitoring
■ Summary & Conclusions

8
Introduction

Testing is just a simple go/ no go test.

Either the cables passes or it fails, no further local information is

gathered.

With regards to DC testing we say: No, Thank You

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Introduction

By example of MV cables:

Does VLF testing solve all problems then?

Unfortunately not....

Unlike DC testing, VLF testing will find major

workmanship problems though. So from a safety
point of view it will be safe to energize the cable
after successfully passing the VLF test.

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Introduction

■ Nowadays generally known that a withstand test only will not

identify all defects

■ No matter what type of excitation voltage used

■ Main reason why partial discharge diagnostics are becoming
standardized for commissioning testing throughout the entire
world

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Introduction

Following weak-spots for e.g.

can not be identified during a
withstand test.

Improper shrinking and wrong

size of bolted connector used

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Introduction

Bad peeling (Sweden)

13
Introduction

Poor cable preparation

(should be smooth,
glass no option)

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Introduction

Poor cable
preparation

15
Introduction

Also exotic failures can

be identified:

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Agenda

■ Introduction
■ Acceptance/ commissioning testing
■ Condition Monitoring
■ Summary & Conclusions

17
Acceptance/ commissioning testing

As we have seen in the previous slides a simple withstand test only

is not sufficient, but what is a proper commissioning procedure for
medium-voltage cables?

Recommended procedure:
 Outer sheath integrity test
 VLF test at 3U0 and 0.1Hz for 15 minutes (IEC standard)
 Offline PD Diagnosis

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing

Focussing on PD diagnostics then following needs to be considered:

 PD characteristics comparable with power frequency?

 Expert knowledge needed?
 Trending limits known?

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
PD Characteristics at different excitation voltages

continuous AC Cosine
Damped AC
sinusoidal rectangular

0.1 Hz 50 Hz 20 - 400 Hz 0.1 Hz 20 - 400 Hz

20 - 300 Hz Ground Transition

wave

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
PD Characteristics at different excitation voltages

Applicable excitation voltages for PD diagnostics:

 50/60 Hz power frequency (laboratories)
 Resonance voltages (20-300Hz)
 Damped AC voltages (DAC) (20 and 400Hz)
 VLF CR voltage (polarity reversal: 20 and 400Hz)

Not recommended excitation voltages for PD diagnostics:

 VLF Sinus 0.1Hz (difference in frequency 500/600 times)

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Expert knowledge needed

In the recent years lots of development have been spent on the

evaluation software:
 Algorithms are now able to automatically evaluate the measured
data in real time
 Classifying PD pulses by use of weighing factors

Making PD diagnostics available for everybody!

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Expert knowledge needed

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Trending limits

Trending limits for newly installed cables are very simple:

 The entire cable and its accessories should be completely

PD free

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Case Study 1

Commissioning test on a newly installed XLPE cable

 Operation voltage: 12/20 kV

 Cable length: 2308 m
 Insulation: NA2XS(F)2Y 3x1x240
 Joints: 7
 Year of installation: 2016
 Withstand test: passed (3Uo, 60 minutes)

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Case Study 1

PD Mapping @ Uo PD Mapping @ 1.5Uo

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Case Study 1

PD Mapping @ 1.7Uo PD Mapping @ 2Uo

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Acceptance/ commissioning testing
Case Study 1

Summary:

 Yet another proof that a withstand test only is not sufficient

 PD detected and localized in a joint at 1880m in blue phase
 PD not allowed  replacement recommended

 Joint will be replaced by service contractor on his own cost

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Agenda

■ Introduction
■ Acceptance/ commissioning testing
■ Condition Monitoring
■ Summary & Conclusions

29
Condition monitoring

Goal of condition monitoring/ preventative maintenance is to get a

non-destructive health assessment of the cable which will enable to:

 Identify local defects

 Identify the level of insulation degradation

This all prevent outages, extend the life time, increase

reliability/availability of networks and reduce costs.

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Condition monitoring

For condition monitoring following procedure is recommended:

 Offline PD diagnostics
 Offline dielectric diagnostics e.g. tanDelta measurement*

* To obtain the global degradation the cable insulation should

consist of one insulation medium only

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Condition monitoring
Case Study 2

Condition monitoring on a service aged mixed cable

 Operation voltage: 12/20 kV

 Cable length: 653 m
 Insulation: NA2XS(F)2Y and NAKBA
 Joints: 7
 Year of installation: 1973

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Condition monitoring
Case Study 2

tanDelta results
 Local problem in L3

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Condition monitoring
Case Study 2

PD Mapping @ Uo PD Mapping @ Uo
VLF Sinus 0.1Hz VLF CR 0.1Hz (210Hz)

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Condition monitoring
Case Study 2

PD Mapping @ 2Uo PD Mapping @ 2Uo

VLF Sinus 0.1Hz VLF CR 0.1Hz (210Hz)

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Condition monitoring
Case Study 2

Summary:

 tanDelta measurement helped to identify local problem

 PD diagnosis with VLF Sinus 0.1Hz did not identify the failure
position, VLF CR did
 At operating voltage, cable apart from failure position, PD free
 At elevated voltages several PD defects in accessories
localised

 Trending measurement recommended after 3 years

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 DAC available for HV cables also?

37
Summary and conclusions

Commissioning testing:
 Withstand testing only is not sufficient as a commissioning test
 PD diagnostics are strongly recommended and widely applied
 Excitation voltage should be comparable to operating frequency

Condition monitoring:
 For condition monitoring in addition a tanDelta diagnosis is needed
 A tanDelta diagnosis can also identify local problems

38