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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY
Evaluation of Power System Lightning
Performance—Part II: Application to an Overhead
Distribution Network
Massimo Brignone, Federico Delfino, Member, IEEE, Renato Procopio, Member, IEEE, Mansueto Rossi,
and Farhad Rachidi, Fellow, IEEE
Abstract—The paper aims at defining a methodology to evalu-
ate the lightning performance of a system of overhead distribution
lines. As is well known, the evaluation of the lightning performance
relies generally on a Monte Carlo approach that generates many
different lightning events and calculates the corresponding over-
voltages. To perform such calculation, the power system computer
aided design (PSCAD) module developed in the companion paper
is adopted. However, as any call to PSCAD implies a nonnegligi-
ble computational effort, here an efficient approach is presented
in order to limit the number of simulations as much as possi-
ble. The obtained results are compared with the ones provided by
other available techniques both on simple structures in order to
highlight the main features of the method and on a typical Ital-
ian distribution network segment. The comparative analysis shows
good agreement between the methods and the effectiveness of the
proposed technique in terms of computational effort reduction.
Index Terms—Monte Carlo methods, overvoltage protection,
power distribution lines, power system lightning effects.
I. INTRODUCTION
HE increasing attention toward power quality problems
T has increased the interest on the assessment of lightning
impact on power systems by researchers and engineers [1].
In this context, the evaluation of the lightning performance
of distribution networks is very important when dealing
with the design of their lightning protection systems. The
lightning performance typically consists of curves reporting
how many lightning faults per year the system may experience
as a function of its insulation level, and so it expresses the
probability that the line is subject to an overvoltage greater than
its critical-flash-over (CFO) voltage.
Lightning may cause flashovers on distribution lines from
both direct strikes and induced voltages from nearby strikes.
Direct lightning strikes to power distribution lines cause
insulation flashover in a great majority. On the other hand,
indirect strikes are more frequent and, in the presence of tall
structures, can occur even at very close distances to the line.
Manuscript received May 16, 2016; revised July 8, 2016; accepted August
10, 2016.
M. Brignone, F. Delfino, R. Procopio, and M. Rossi are with the Naval,
ICT, and Electrical Engineering Department, University of Genoa, Genova
I-16145, Italy (e-mail: massimo.brignone@unige.it; federico.delfino@unige.it;
renato.procopio@unige.it; mansueto.rossi@unige.it).
F. Rachidi is with the EMC Laboratory, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology,
Lausanne CH-1015, Switzerland (e-mail: farhad.rachidi@epfl.ch).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TEMC.2016.2601657
0018-9375 © 2016 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See http://www.ieee.org/publications standards/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
1
For this reason, especially in low-insulation systems, they
represent one of the most significant causes of lightning-related
outages. As a consequence, the literature has been focused on
the evaluation of the indirect lightning performance which is,
unfortunately, a very hard task from a computational point of
view, as it requires us to solve the problem of the field-to-line
coupling a significant number of times in order to account for
all the possible values that the stochastic variables can assume.
To overcome this problem, first a simplified approach has been
proposed [2] that basically adopts the Rusck formula for the
calculation of the maximum amplitude of the lightning-induced
voltages on the line. Then, such an approach has been improved
in order to account both for the finite length of multiconductor
line and for the ground finite conductivity [3].
The complexity of the power distribution networks character-
ized by a number of lines (main feeder with laterals) and by the
presence of several power components (e.g., transformers and
surge arresters) has been accounted for in [4], where a heuris-
tic technique has been applied in order to reduce the number
of calls to the coupling code. The recently released IEEE Std.
1410-2011 [5] employs that method for the evaluation of the
induced-voltage flashover rate of overhead distribution lines.
More recently, the influence of direct strokes on lightning per-
formance of distribution networks has been analyzed [6], where
it was shown in particular that, if the rate of flashovers along the
whole line is of interest, independently from their locations, the
effect of the direct strikes can be accounted for by simply adding
the rate of direct strikes to the indirect lightning performance, as
each direct strike to the line is likely to cause a flashover. More
detailed analysis of the effect of direct strikes has been carried
out in [7] and [8]. In [7], guidelines for the optimal spacing
between arresters are given and in [8], the direct and indirect
strike flashover rates are characterized from a statistical point
of view. However, based on these studies, the lightning perfor-
mance of a medium voltage (MV) distribution network in its
inherent complexity cannot be directly evaluated.
The aim of this paper is to evaluate the lightning performance
of a power distribution network considered in its complexity
and accounting both for direct and indirect strikes.
In order to reduce the computational effort, a methodology
is proposed in order to limit as much as possible the analysis
performed with the algorithm presented in the companion paper
[9]. Moreover, the importance of the instant in which the light-
ning occurs is highlighted, showing that, for very low insulation
levels, the maximum overvoltage depends on such instant, but
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2 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

such relationship is shadowed by the statistical procedure in the

evaluation of the system lightning performance.
The paper is organized as follows: in Sections II and III,
respectively, the proposed procedure for the lightning perfor-
mance evaluation is explained and validated on a system of
overhead transmission lines (OHL) terminated with resistances.
Section IV is dedicated to the evaluation of the lightning perfor-
mance of a realistic network accounting both for its topological
complexity and for realistic terminations. Finally, conclusive
remarks are drawn in Section V.

II. EVALUATION OF THE LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE

In this section, the proposed procedure for the evaluation
of the lightning performance of a multiconductor transmission
lines (MTL) system consisting of M conductors with length L is
here presented, first recalling the main features of the statistical
approach (Section II-A) and then defining a technique that al-
Fig. 1. Geometry of the MTL system.
lows us to reduce the number of indirect events to be processed
with the code described in the companion paper (Section II-B).
According to the geometry (see Fig. 1) and the notations of
A. Statistical Approach the companion paper [9], such area is indicated here as

The procedure for the evaluation of the lightning performance
of power system has been proposed in [3] and [4] and is briefly
recalled in what follows.
1) A large number of lightning events ntot is randomly gen-
erated. Each event is characterized by the point of impact
PF = (xF , yF ) and the channel-base current amplitude
I0 . According to [10] and [11], the current is assumed to
follow a log-normal probability density function, while
the points of impact coordinates are uniformly distributed
into a striking area containing the power system of interest
and all the possible lightning event that can cause CFOs
[3], [4].
2) The application of the electrogeometric model (EGM)
[12] allows us to choose whether the selected event is
a direct or an indirect stroke. In any case, the event is
processed as outlined in the companion paper in order to
evaluate the maximum overvoltage generated.
3) Such overvoltage is compared with the line CFO and a
counter n is increased by one unit if the overvoltage is
greater than the CFO.
4) The ratio between the final value of the counter n and ntot
is computed in order to evaluate the probability of having
a dangerous overvoltage.
B. Reduction of the Computational Effort
The proposed statistical approach requires a very large num-
ber of calls to the code that calculates the indirect overvoltages,
thus requiring a prohibitive computational effort. In this sec-
tion, an efficient technique to reduce the number of such calls is
presented.
1) Choice of the Domain for the Points of Impact: As out-
lined in the previous subsection, first of all a suitable area A has
to be chosen containing the points of impact of all the possible
events that can cause dangerous overvoltages.
A = [xm in , xm ax ] × [ym in , ym ax ] (1)
where xm in = −L/2 and xm ax = 3L/2 (see [3], [4]). ym in and
ym ax can be chosen as follows:
1) ym in can be chosen as the value under which, for any
peak current [10], [11], the power system will always ex-
perience a direct strike. Recalling the electrogeometric
criterion described in the companion paper [9], one can
express the lateral distance as a function of the peak cur-
rent. As can be expected, such a function monotonically
increases; so, the value corresponding to the minimum
current can be selected as ym in . In the following, ym in
will be set as 15.00 m, which corresponds to about 2 kA
(that has a probability smaller than 0.016% according to
the current lognormal probability density function);
2) ym ax can be chosen as the horizontal distance at which,
no matter what the peak current is, the resulting overvolt-
age will always be smaller than the CFO. According to
the Rusck–Darveniza formula [12], one can set ym ax as
follows:
 
38.80 0.15
ym ax = h+ √ max {I0 } . (2)
CFO σg
In the following, ym ax is assumed to be 1005.0 m, correspond-
ing to the most critical situation characterized by a peak current
of 100.0 kA (that has a probability smaller than 0.0038% ac-
cording to the current lognormal probability density function),
a ground conductivity of 0.001 S/m and a CFO of 50 kV.
2) Evaluation of the Maximum Overvoltage: Setting rm in =
ym in and rm ax = x2m ax + ym 2
ax , one can construct the light-
ning electromagnetic field database through steps 1–3 of the
algorithm presented in the companion paper [9]. As the appli-
cation of steps 4–9 of the same algorithm allows us to find out,
for any i = 1, . . ., M , the function Vi (x, t) for a given lightning
peak current and point of impact, with a simple postprocessing
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BRIGNONE et al.: EVALUATION OF POWER SYSTEM LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE—PART II: APPLICATION TO AN OVERHEAD
one can find out the maximum induced overvoltage as
VIm0 ,P
ax
F
= max Vi (x, t)
x∈[0,L ],t∈[T s ,T e ]
i=1,...,M
where [Ts , Te ] is the duration of the lightning electromag-
netic fields. Then, if one defines a grid of impact points
Psq = (xs , yq ), with s = 1, . . ., S and q = 1, . . ., Q, in the area
A defined in (1), it is possible to write, by calling S × Q times
the code, the matrix
 
m ax
V = V1,P . (4)
sq
So, for any event selected by the procedure defined in the
previous subsection, the overvoltage can be evaluated by using
an interpolation procedure as follows:
VVm ax (I0 , PF ) = I0 · INTERP2 [V, PF ]
where the INTERP2 function performs a bilinear interpolation
of the elements of matrix V when the impact point is PF and
the channel-base current amplitude is I0 .
The question arising at this point is how to choose the se-
quences xs and yq . This can be done in an iterative way: first,
one can select two initial sequences x0s and yq0 . The first one x0s
can be chosen selecting many more points in the neighborhood
of the line extremities in order to account for possible boundary
effects; the second one yq0 as a not equally spaced sequence
with many more points in proximity of the line (according to
the Rusck formula, stating that the overvoltage is proportional
to the inverse of the y coordinate of the impact point). Then, at
each iteration j, all the middle points of the sequence yqj − 1 will
be added to the sequence, thus giving origin to the following
recursive scheme:
xjs = xjs −1 ∀s = 1, . . . , S (6)
 j   j −1  From a physical point of view, it should be observed that the
yq : q = 1, . . . , 2Q − 1 = yq : q = 1, . . . , Q
−1
the final result, which strongly depends on the ground conduc-
yqj − 1 + yqj + 1
∪ : q = 1, . . . , Q − 1 . (7)
2 has been shown that the finite ground conductivity enhances
For each iteration j, the matrices Vj are defined by means of
j
(4) where the impact point is Psq = (xjs , yqj ) . For any CFO, the
lightning performance is calculated by means of (5) using both
Vj and Vj −1 and one can conclude that the process is stabilized
when the distance between the obtained curves is smaller than
a suitable prefixed threshold.
III. VALIDATION OF THE PROPOSED APPROACH
The aim of this section is to validate the procedure presented
in Section II. To do this, a real Italian distribution network OHL
has been considered, consisting of M = 3 conductors of length
L = 1 km, whose geometry is summarized in Table I.
In the following, both a lossy (σg = 0.001 S/ m) and a per-
fectly conducting ground (PEC) have been considered with a
relative dielectric constant equal to 10. As far as the terminations
are concerned, two simple configurations have been analyzed:
each conductor is terminated at both ends with a resistance
(Case-1) equal to the characteristic impedance of the conductor
3
TABLE I
GEOMETRY OF THE MTL SYSTEM
(3)
Cond. 1 Cond. 2 Cond. 3
Height from ground 8.0 m 8.0 m 8.6 m
Distance from y-axis −1.2 m 1.2 m 0.0 m
Conductor diameter 0.64 cm 0.64 cm 0.64 cm
alone and ground and (Case-2) equal to twice the value of the
previous case. Moreover, both first and subsequent strokes have
been considered, characterized by a current log-normal proba-
bility density function with mean μ equal to 31.1 kA for first
strokes and 12.3 kA for subsequent, and variance σ equal to
0.484 kA for first and 0.53 kA for subsequent strokes [10].
For each case, ten Monte Carlo replications were performed,
(5) each of them consisting of 10 000 runs. In all the graphs, the
probability mean value among the ten obtained is reported, with
a bar whose amplitude is twice its standard deviation.
The first test is relevant to the choice of the grid Psq . Exploit-
ing the symmetry of the system, one can set xm ax = L/2 and
define the following initial grid: x0s ∈ {−500.0, −200.0, 0.0,
5.0, 10.0, 200.0, 500.0} and yq0 ∈ {15.0, 20.0, 50.0, 100.0,
500.0, 1000.0}, which requires us to perform 30 simulations.
As can be seen in Fig. 2 that depicts the results relevant to first
strokes, three iterations are sufficient to stabilize the process,
thus requiring 105 simulations in all the four situations, i.e.,
a) lossy ground Case-1, b) PEC Case-1, c) lossy ground Case-2,
and d) PEC Case-2. Moreover, the bar amplitude highlights
that the obtained values for the probability have a good degree
of reliability. For example, in the case of a lossy-matched MTL
analyzed with the 105 calls grid, the probability to have an
overvoltage greater than 50 kV is 20% ± 0.5%.
value of the termination resistance does not affect significantly
tivity (in accordance to what presented in [3] and [4] where it
the overvoltages). Similar results have been found for the case
of subsequent strokes that are not reported here for the sake of
brevity. As could be expected examining the parameters of the
two log-normal distributions, for all the cases, the probability of
having a dangerous overvoltage caused by a subsequent return
stroke is much smaller than the first one (in accordance to what
reported in [1], [2], and [13]).
The second test compares the proposed approach with the
ones proposed in [3] and [4]. In particular, Borghetti et al. [3]
need to call the coupling code for each run of the considered
Monte Carlo replication while [4] applies a heuristic technique
that allows us to exclude some events based on the previous
extractions. As can be seen in Fig. 3, in all the cases (a)–(d) the
three approaches are in excellent agreement.
However, for each replication, the proposed approach (with
the 105 calls grid) has a percentage of code calls of 1.05%
(i.e., 105/10 000), while the method proposed in [4] has a per-
centage depending on the CFO level. For the case of a PEC
ground, such percentage ranges from 7% (for very high CFOs)
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4 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

Fig. 2. Illustration of the interactive process for the grid definition: (a) lossy ground and Case-1, (b) PEC ground and Case-1, (c) lossy ground and Case-2, and
(d) PEC ground and Case-2.

Fig. 3. Comparison of the proposed approach with the ones in [3] and [4]: (a) lossy ground and Case-1, (b) PEC ground and Case-1, (c) lossy ground and Case-2,
and (d) PEC ground and Case-2.

to 9%, (for low-insulation levels) while the lossy case needs
more computational effort, as the percentage to obtain a reliable
result for a CFO equal to 50 kV reaches 23%.
It should be observed that, in principle, for each Monte
Carlo replication, the analysis conducted with the method pro-
posed in [4] should require new calls to the coupling code,
which increases the overall computational effort, while the
proposed approach instead relies on the interpolation of the
predefined grid, which means that, no matter the number of
Monte Carlo replications, the overall number of code calls will
always be 105.
The next test is relevant to the analysis of the effect of direct
strikes. The number of events that has led to direct strikes has
a mean value μ = 312 with a variance σ = 19 for case (a),
μ = 314 and σ = 22 for case (b), μ = 315 and σ = 14 for case
(c) and μ = 315 and σ = 17 for case (d). As described in the
companion paper [9], the developed code is able to automatically
distinguish between direct and indirect events; as a consequence
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BRIGNONE et al.: EVALUATION OF POWER SYSTEM LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE—PART II: APPLICATION TO AN OVERHEAD 5

Fig. 4. Accounting for direct strokes in the lightning performance evaluation: (a) lossy ground and Case-1, (b) PEC ground and Case-1, (c) lossy ground and
Case-2, and (d) PEC ground and Case-2.

Fig. 5. The ratio between the probability of having an indirect overvoltage greater than CFO over the probability of having an overvoltage greater than CFO is
presented: (a) lossy ground and Case-1, (b) PEC ground and Case-1, (c) lossy ground and Case-2, and (d) PEC ground and Case-2.

it can be used in order to analyze the effect of direct strokes on
the overall lightning performance.
In all the situations, it is apparent that assuming that each
direct strike causes flashover [6] is effective, while neglecting
the direct strokes results in an underestimation of the lightning
performance (see Fig. 4).
In order to check whether the influence of direct strokes
depends on the insulation level, the ratio between the prob-
ability that a direct event will cause a dangerous overvolt-
age and the overall probability is plotted in Fig. 5 for
the four cases. Examining the figure, one can conclude the
following.
1) As expected (see [8]), all the curves show a decreasing
trend as a function of CFO, which means that the effect
of indirect strikes is more meaningful for low-insulation
levels.
2) The lossy ground enhances the effect of the indirect strikes
that provide a nonnegligible contribution even for very
high CFOs, while in the case of a PEC, for insulation
levels greater than 150 kV, only direct effects matter.
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6 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

Fig. 7. HF one-phase equivalent circuit for transformers.

steady-state situation. As a consequence, the model depicted in

Fig. 7 is adopted here.
Fig. 6. Distribution network topology. In this model, C10 , C20 , and C12 are the capacitances to be
added in order to account for high-frequency effects. In order to
evaluate the parameters of the equivalent circuit of Fig. 7, one
3) The reflections in a not matched MTL amplify the un- can either use typical values (as suggested in [14]–[16]) or set
certainty bar, especially for high insulation levels [see up the following procedure in order to have a possible estimate
case (c)]. of such capacitances. In [18], two alternative empirical formu-
las are reported that relate the first (anti)resonance frequency
IV. LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE OF AN MV (i.e., the frequency corresponding to maximum impedance) of
DISTRIBUTION NETWORK a transformer with its rated voltage and power as follows:

The aim of this section is to evaluate the lightning perfor- fRES = 325A0.275
N /VN0.95 (8)
mance of the MV distribution network represented in Fig. 6, fRES = 220A0.36 0.95
N /VN (9)
where the HV/MV and MV/LV transformers are protected by
surge arresters. From a geometrical point of view, the MV line where AN is the (phase) machine rating (expressed in MVA)
is the same as the one analyzed in the previous section (see and VN is the rated (L-G) voltage (expressed in kV).
Table I). The two laterals are, respectively, at 250 and 750 m So, one can draw the Bode diagram of the transformer in-
from the HV/MV transformer and consist of two MV/LV iden- put impedance as a function of the unknown capacitances and
tical transformers with two 300-m long LV cables. The HV/MV adjust their values in order to obtain a resonance frequency as
transformer is fed by a 132 kV network with infinite short-circuit close as possible to the values predicted by (8) or (9). Start-
power (i.e., an ideal voltage source). First, some considerations ing from the classical typically available data of a transformer
on the transformers and arresters modeling are presented. (i.e., short-circuit voltage, copper losses, no-load current, and
no-load losses), one can evaluate the short-circuit resistance rcc
A. Arresters and reactance xcc (at industrial frequency fr ) as well as the
iron core resistance rm and the magnetizing reactance xm (at
According to the indications reported in [14], the surge ar- industrial frequency). As a consequence, one obtains
resters can be modeled using a nonlinear V–I characteristics,  
thus not considering a frequency-dependent model. In the fol- 1 xcc
Z1 (ω) = Z2 (ω) = rcc + jω (10)
lowing, such characteristics have been chosen according to a 2 2πfr
typical ABB 15 kV arrester [15]. jωrm xm
Zm (ω) = . (11)
2πfr rm + jωxm
B. Transformers
Examining Fig. 7, it is apparent that the transformer
For the evaluation of the lightning overvoltages, the imple- impedance (seen at the primary side with the secondary one
mentation of an adequate high-frequency model for HV/MV short circuited) is given by
and MV/LV transformers is of crucial importance [16]. The
Z1 (ω) + Zp (ω)
most complex and accurate models have been proposed in ZT 1 (ω) = (12)
[16] and [17] and basically perform a rational approximation 1 + jω (C10 + C12 ) (Z1 (ω) + Zp (ω))
of the frequency response of the transformer admittance ma- where
trix. However, such models require specific measurements in Z2 (ω) Zm (ω)
order to obtain the suitable entries for the matrix. A more sim- Zp (ω) = . (13)
Z2 (ω) + Zm (ω)
plified approach consists of either substituting the traditional
low-frequency model with a π-circuit made of capacitances, Thus, one can adjust the values of C10 + C12 such that the
or to combine the low-frequency model with suitable capaci- peak of ZT 1 occurs at the frequency predicted by (8) or (9).
tors. As shown in [16], the second option provides better results Repeating the procedure for the secondary side, it is possible to
and, most of all, also allows us to represent correctly the initial get an estimate of C20 + C12 . As an example, let us consider the
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BRIGNONE et al.: EVALUATION OF POWER SYSTEM LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE—PART II: APPLICATION TO AN OVERHEAD
Fig. 8. Estimate of the HV/MV transformer high-frequency capacitance at the
MV side and the Bode diagram of the transformer impedance.
case of the HV/MV transformer that has a short-circuit voltage
of 10%, no-load current of 0.1%, copper losses of 0.3%, and no
load losses of 0.01%. The above presented procedure produces
an estimate of C20 + C12 (i.e., at MV level) of about 2.0 nF
corresponding to a resonance frequency of about 90 kHz (see
Fig. 8).
Repeating the procedure for the HV side results in an esti-
mate for C10 + C12 of about 1.5 nF. It should be observed that
both values are in good agreement with the ones proposed in
[16], which suggests a value of 3.0 nF for a typical HV/MV
transformer.
C. Evaluation of the Lightning Performance
The presence of nonlinear devices (e.g., the arresters) does
not allow us to replicate the procedure defined in Section II,
as formula (5) does not hold anymore. To overcome the
problem, one has to add the current to the interpolation
process.
Let us consider again Psq = (xs , yq ), with s = 1, . . ., S
and q = 1, . . ., Q, in the area A defined in (1), a current se-
quence I0,r with r = 1, . . ., R, and evaluate the following
three-dimensional (3D) matrix:
 
V = VIm0 , ax
r ,P s q
(14)
which requires S × Q × R code calls. So, for any event selected
by the statistical procedure, the overvoltage can be evaluated by
means of a 3D interpolation as follows:
VVm ax (I0 , PF ) = INTERP3 [V, PF , I0 ]
where the function INTERP3 performs a 3D interpolation of
the elements of matrix V when the impact point is PF and the
channel-base current amplitude I0 .
The proposed approach has been compared with those pre-
sented in [3] and [4], reaching good agreement, as can be
seen by examining Fig. 9. Moreover, for each replication, the
7
Fig. 9. Comparison of the proposed approach with the ones in [3] and [4] in
the evaluation of the lightning performance of a complex distribution network.
TABLE II
MAXIMUM OVERVOLTAGE VERSUS PRECONTINGENCY MAXIMUM VOLTAGE
Max Max overvoltage Max precontingency Max overvoltage
precontingency (kV) voltage (kV) (kV)
voltage (kV)
0.0 52.5 10.8 65.9
6.1 55.9 11.5 72.0
8.2 57.9 11.8 72.9
9.9 58.3 11.9 73.1
proposed approach has a percentage of code calls of 11.4%,
while the method proposed in [4] has again a percentage de-
pending on the CFO level, ranging from 10.4% for CFO equal
to 250 kV to 28.6% for CFO equal to 50 kV.
The simulations required to obtain the curves depicted in
Fig. 9 have been done supposing that the lightning discharge
occurs in the system working at a steady state. As explained in
the companion paper [9], the PSCAD snapshot feature [19] has
been used in order to run the initial transient simulation only
once and to store the prelightning discharge conditions. This
implies that, for any code call required to define matrix (14), the
simulation length is about 10 μs with a time step of 0.01 μs.
The question that arises at this point is relevant to the influence
of the time instant at which the lightning discharge occurs both
on the system maximum overvoltage and on the overall light-
ning performance. Table II reports the maximum overvoltage
produced in the system by a lightning discharge characterized
by a current of 31.1 kA (i.e., the mean value of first stroke
log-normal distribution) and striking at a horizontal distance of
350.0 m to the line center and equidistant to the line termina-
tions, as a function of the maximum preperturbation voltage. As
can be seen, evaluating such overvoltage without accounting for
the precontingency voltage (i.e., when it is 0 kV), one underes-
timates the final result producing an error that can reach about
40%. Unfortunately, the nonlinearities of the devices present
(15)
in the network do not allow us to consider the lightning over-
voltage as a variation with respect to the previous steady-state
voltage. Anyway, as the analyzed MV distribution network has
a rated voltage of 15 kV (L–L), one could expect that the effect
of the predischarge voltage could introduce a variation in the
final overvoltage of about 10–15 kV, thus influencing mostly
the cases in which the insulation level is quite low.
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8 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY
As far as the lightning performance is concerned, in principle,
the lightning strike time instant should be considered as an
additional variable of the Monte Carlo simulations. This allows
us to conclude that the influence of the instant of the occurrence
of the lightning discharge is substantially negligible for all the
values of CFO of practical interest.
Finally, a comment on the computational aspects of the pro-
posed approach is in order. Using a Microsoft Windows 8.1 PC
equipped with 8 Gb of RAM and Intel Core i7-2600 CPU at
3.4 GHz, the proposed algorithm requires about: 420 s for the
field database creation (it should be underlined that such step
has to be performed only once for a given network), and less
than 1 s for the overvoltage computation (with a time step of
0.01 μs and a simulation length of 0.01 ms).
V. CONCLUSION
A methodology to evaluate the lightning performance of an
MV distribution network was presented, starting from the plat-
form developed in the companion paper. First, a technique to
reduce the overall computational effort was presented and vali-
dated against other methods available in the literature. Then, the
method was applied to a realistic MV network characterized by
a complex topology and by the presence of nonlinear devices.
Finally, the effect of the instant of the occurrence of the lightning
discharge was analyzed both on the system overvoltage related
to a specific event and on the overall lightning performance.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank Prof. M. Paolone from DESL
Laboratory, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, for his valu-
able comments and suggestions to improve the quality of the
paper.
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Massimo Brignone’ photograph and biography not available at the time of
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