12th IEEE International Conference on the Properties and Applications of Dielectric Materials - Xi'an - China
Corona Discharge under Non-Sinusoidal Voltage
Excitation at Very Low Frequency
S. Morsalin* and B.T. Phung
The University of New South Wales
Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia
sayidul.morsalin@unsw.edu.au
Abstract- For condition assessment of electrical insulation, high-
voltage testing at very-low-frequency (typically 0.1 Hz or lower)
has been widely used in recent years as an alternative to normal
testing at power frequency (50/60 Hz). In this paper, an
experimental study of AC corona discharge under the application
of sinusoidal and non-sinusoidal (rectangular and sawtooth)
waveforms is presented. Here, a comparative study at both
frequencies is reported based on the phase-resolved discharge
patterns and various IEC 60270 integrated parameters such as
discharge magnitude, repetition rates, current, etc. Measurement
results reveal that these diagnostic characteristics are strongly
dependent on the excitation frequency as well as the shape of
voltage waveform. In particular, for the same applied peak
voltage, very low frequency excitation yields larger discharge
magnitude and higher repetition rate and the phase range of
discharge activities correlates with the maximum voltage slew
rate.
I. INTRODUCTION
For diagnostic assessment of insulation condition, partial
discharge (PD) activities are generally considered an early
sign of insulation degradation. To measure these discharges,
the most common method is to use sinusoidal voltage
waveform at power frequency (50/60 Hz) applying to test
objects. An alternative method is using very-low-frequency
(VLF), typically 0.1 Hz or lower. As the reactive power
requirement from the test supply is much reduced, VLF testing
is increasingly being used, especially for field testing of high-
capacitance high-voltage cables [1-2].
To date, the sinusoidal voltage waveform as excitation has
been extensively investigated. However, there is still limited
research conducted on non-sinusoidal waveforms at VLF [3-
4]. Furthermore, it is a timely appeal to understand PD
behaviors as some power equipment and electronic devices
could be operated under the excitation of non-sinusoidal
voltage waveforms such as square, sawtooth, etc [5].
A number of studies [3-6] have been conducted to
investigate PD behaviors under the application of various
waveforms. The analysis reported in [2] compares the phase-
resolved partial discharge (PRPD) patterns for sinusoidal and
cos-rectangular (cos-rect) waveforms at 50 Hz and 0.1 Hz and
concludes that the PRPD pattern for a cos-rect waveform is
complicated or even sometimes impossible to illustrate as
compared to the sinusoidal waveform. The applications of
triangular voltage [3], square voltage [4-5], and trapezoidal
voltage [6] have been investigated to examine the various
discharge types (surface and cavity) at 50 Hz and it was
reported that PD characteristics are strongly affected by the
978-1-5386-5788-1/18/$31.00 ©2018 IEEE
instantaneous voltage, its time derivative dv/dt, ramp time,
slew rate.
For corona discharge in particular, the electron avalanche,
usually generated by the liberation of free electrons from the
electrode and corresponding ionization due to the collision
with gas molecules, initiates the discharge in gas which is very
much likely to rely on the rate of change of the applied
voltage, rising and falling time, duty cycle etc. Hence, the
excitation waveforms and frequencies are considered
influential in stimulating the physical process and thus the
discharge characteristics [6-7].
Therefore, to facilitate better diagnostic assessment, this
paper presents a comparative phase-resolved study of corona
discharge in ambient air under sinusoidal, square, and
sawtooth waveforms of the applied voltage. From
experimental data, various discharge characteristics such as
discharge magnitude, repetition rate, current and quadratic rate
at very-low (0.1 Hz) and power (50 Hz) frequencies are
determined and compared.
II. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
The time-resolved PD measurement circuit for the
experiment is depicted in Fig. 1. The experimental work
follows conventional PD detection techniques and fully
compliant with the well-known IEC 60270 and IEEE 400.2
Standards [7]. The system was employed to record corona
discharges from a needle-plane electrode geometry. The
needle electrode had a sharp tip with radius of 50 μm and was
connected a high voltage supply. The plane electrode was a
flat circular disk with diameter of 78 mm and was connected
to ground. The insulating medium between electrodes was
ambient air and the gap was 45 mm.
Filter Computer
L
R
Controller
USB
Power
Amplifier
Ctest Ck
AC Source
Waveform
Quadripole
Acquisition
Generator
Unit
Unit
Fig. 1. Block diagram of the measurement circuit.
The circuit shown in Fig.1 consists of a high-voltage AC
source, a low-pass filter, and an Mtronix MPD600 PD
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measuring system which includes a quadripole unit (CPL III. RESULTS
542), an acquisition unit, an MCU 502 USB controller, and a A. Sinusoidal Waveform
PC with MPD600 software. For the AC source, the excitation
signal was generated using an Agilent 33500B waveform
generator and then amplified by a TREK 20/20C-HS power
amplifier. The filter unit consists of a 20 mH inductor for
blocking high frequency switching interference coming from
the supply and a 50 kΩ resistor for protection in case of full
breakdown. The discharge activities are recorded in PC using
that Mtronix MPD600 software and the data are post-
processed and analyzed in MATLAB. Prior to each
(a) (b)
measurement, the system is calibrated by injecting a small
amount of charges. Fig. 2. PRPD pattern of 50 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour
The whole experiment was conducted over 6 consecutive
days with relatively negligible humidity change in every day. The PD phase-resolved scatter plots for sinusoidal
Each test sequence was carried out for 6 hours at applied waveform at 50 Hz and VLF are depicted in Fig. 2 and Fig. 3
voltage of 8 kV (peak). At the end of every hour, discharge respectively. Here, the images were captured in the last 10
activities were recorded. Each recording time was 10 minutes minutes of the initial and final hour. It can be seen that PD
which corresponds to 60 consecutive cycles of 0.1 Hz or activities occur only in the negative half-cycle and scatter
30,000 cycles of 50 Hz. Note that the experimental inception around the peak region of the applied voltage. The patterns
voltage (PDIV) was measured at 4.6 kV which is very close to acquired from the first hour exhibit a higher number of
the theoretical inception voltage of 5.2 kV calculated from discharge activities than the final hour. Also, discharge
Peek’s formula [8]. activities at 50 Hz are comparatively much less dense than that
In this work, the overall characteristics of PD activities are at 0.1 Hz.
quantified by the following integrated parameters: For the case of sinusoidal waveform, IEC 60270 integrated
1 (1) parameters to characterize PD activities are tabulated in Table
I= ( | q1| + | q2 | +........+ | qn | ) II. Comparing results with power frequency, the maximum
Trec
discharge (Qmax) and average discharge (Qavg) magnitudes at
1 (2) VLF are larger in general whilst other parameters exhibit
D= ( | q1|2 + | q2 |2 +........+ | qn |2 )
Trec much higher value. Both frequencies produce similar phase-
resolved patterns over approximately the same phase window.
N
PRPS = (3)
Trec
TABLE II
N PD CHARACTERIZATION UNDER SINUSOIDAL WAVEFORM
PRPC = (4) 50 Hz 0.1 Hz
N cycle Parameters
1 Hour 6 Hour 1 Hour 6 Hour
Here Trec, I, D, PRPS, and PRPC denote the recording time, Qmax (pC) 130.14 141.14 273.24 204.89
discharge current, quadratic rate (QR), pulse repetition per
Qavg (pC) 64.04 65.71 82.07 86.58
second and pulse repetition per cycle respectively where N and
Ncycle represent the total number of pulses and AC cycles. PRPS (PDs/s) 100.00 44.14 3811 3638
The experiment was conducted for the following test PRPC (PDs/cycle) 2.00 0.882 38116 36386
parameters as shown in Table I.
Current, I (nA) 6.40 2.90 312.83 315.05
TABLE I 2
QR, D (aC /s) 0.423 0.197 27.51 29.83
PARAMETERS USED IN EXPERIMENT

Parameters Value

Filter Bandwidth 300 kHz

Filter Center Frequency 250 kHz
Air Gap 45 mm
Temperature 25-30 0C
Noise Level 42 pC
Sinusoidal, Square, and
Waveform
Sawtooth
Calibration 50 pC (a) (b)
Pulse Counting ≥ 50 pC Fig. 3. PRPD pattern of 0.1 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour.
Coupling Capacitance (Ck) 1 nF

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B. Square Waveform C. Sawtooth Waveform

(a) (b) (a) (b)

Fig. 4. PRPD pattern of 50 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour.
The PD patterns for square waveform at very-low and
power-frequency are illustrated in Fig. 4 and Fig. 5
respectively. Unlike the sinusoidal waveform in which PDs
are concentrated around the negative voltage peak, here the
distributions scatter throughout the whole negative half-cycle
from 1800 to 3600 phase angle. Another feature is that larger
magnitudes of discharge are noticeable during the transition
period where the voltage waveform reverses its polarity.
The discharge characteristics for square waveform are
summarized in Table III. Comparing with sinusoidal
waveform, a relatively lower discharge magnitude is observed
in square waveform. This may be associated with the
increased slew rate (dv/dt) because the negligible rise/falling
time of square wave results in a smaller magnitude of corona
discharge. In fact, these trends are not merely observed during
the recording period of the first and final hour but also
experienced over the six hours of test sequence.
Exhibiting the same trend as in sinusoidal waveform, square
waveform excitation also produces higher repetition rate
(PRPS) and repetition rate per cycle (PRPC) at 0.1 Hz as
compared to 50 Hz. The maximum discharge at VLF is around
350 pC whereas, in power frequency, it is around 62 pC.
Fig. 6. PRPD pattern of 50 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour.
Fig. 6 and Fig. 7 are discharge scatter plots for symmetrical
sawtooth waveform at both frequencies (50 and 0.1 Hz)
respectively. Interestingly, the triangular waveform yields
quite similar features to those patterns acquired under
sinusoidal excitation. Therefore, as expected, PD activities are
distributed around the maximum instantaneous voltage.
A summary of IEC 60270 parameters is tabulated in Table
IV. From the table, these parameters are fairly comparable in
every hour of both measurements. The maximum and average
PD magnitude increased from around 52 pC and 87 pC to 57
pC and 196 pC, respectively when the frequency was changed
from 50 Hz to 0.1 Hz. This is because the faster rate of
ramping voltage at high frequency causes the dissimilarity in
PD magnitudes.

(a) (b)

Fig. 7. PRPD pattern of 0.1 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour.

TABLE IV
PD CHARACTERIZATION UNDER SAWTOOTH WAVEFORM
50 Hz 0.1 Hz
Parameters
1 Hour 6 Hour 1 Hour 6 Hour

(a) (b) Qmax (pC) 86.95 82.05 195.42 186.19

Qavg (pC) 52.26 51.39 57.33 56.01
Fig. 5. PRPD pattern of 0.1 Hz excitation: (a) at 1 hour (b) at 6 hour.
PRPS (PDs/s) 315.23 16.97 1241 778.91
TABLE III
PD CHARACTERIZATION UNDER SQUARE WAVEFORM PRPC (PDs/cycle) 6.30 0.339 12418 7789
50 Hz 0.1 Hz Current, I (nA) 16.47 0.872 71.20 43.63
Parameters
1 Hour 6 Hour 1 Hour 6 Hour
2
QR, D (aC /s) 0.862 0.044 4.11 2.46
Qmax (pC) 72.29 86.11 309.31 335.12
Qavg (pC) 53.54 61.36 57.86 67.20
IV. DISCUSSION
PRPS (PDs/s) 206.74 14.12 121.47 63.67
Based on the PRPD patterns presented in Section III, the
PRPC (PDs/cycle) 3.13 0.282 1214.7 636.73
diagram in Fig. 8 illustrates the amount of spreading, 'M , of
Current, I (nA) 37.84 0.866 7.029 4.279 PD activities during the negative half-cycle of the applied
2
QR, D (aC /s) 2.030 0.054 0.414 0.338 voltage for the three waveforms. The square waveform has
maximum spread, followed by the sinusoidal waveform whilst

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Vp
Δφsq
Δφsw
Δφsin
θ(ωt)
Vinc, Vext
Fig. 8. Phase range where PDs occurred for the three waveforms.
the sawtooth waveform has the least scattering, i.e.
'Msquare ! 'Msine ! 'Msawtooth (5)
The extent of spreading of PD phase distribution during the
negative half-cycle appears to relate to the rate of voltage
change, i.e. the time derivative of the voltage waveform
(dv/dt). A faster voltage change results in PD occurred over a
wider phase range. To support this argument, Fourier series
can be utilized to represent any periodic non-sinusoidal
which contributes to the differences between two frequencies
in tabulated IEC 60270 parameters [2, 8].
Faster switching period of polarity in square wave allows
the voltage exceeding the critical inception value immediately
after the zero-crossing. This quicker transition of polarity
generates more discharge; hence more positive space ions.
Besides, there is no conducting surface for space ions. As a
result, during the constant voltage period, accumulated
charges from previous events reduce the electric field in the
gas region. In fact, this is why data in Table III for square
wave are considerably lesser as compared to other waveforms.
On the other hand, sinusoidal and sawtooth voltages rarely
experience this phenomenon because of the non-zero slew rate
during their negative period [4, 6].
V. CONCLUSION
A comparative study of corona discharge at very low
frequency (0.1 Hz) and power frequency (50 Hz) for
sinusoidal and non-sinusoidal excitations is presented.
Experimental results show that the PD phase-resolved
distribution for a square wave is spread over the whole
negative period of applied excitation whereas for sinusoidal
and sawtooth waveforms, PD activities concentrate around the
peak voltage region. In all test sequences, VLF excitation
yields larger discharge, higher repetition rate and so as other
voltage waveforms v  t  as an algebraic sum of harmonic
sinusoidal functions. One can then work out the time
derivative and from which obtain the maximum slew rate. For
the same peak voltage V p , it can be shown that:
­ ZVp sinusoidal waveform
parameters. The behavior could be due to the combined
influence of the slew rate of the applied voltage as well as the
excitation frequency on the physical discharge mechanism.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
§ dv  t  · °
¨ ¸ ® 2 S  p sawtooth waveform (6)
ZV
The authors would like to acknowledge the Australian
© dt ¹max ° 4 S  ZV square waveform
¯ p
where ω denotes the angular frequency. Since 2ω/π < ω <
4ω/π , it clearly reveals that there is a correlation between the
maximum slew rate and the relative spreading of PD activities
as expressed in Eq. 5.
Larger PD characteristic parameters in all cases at VLF
excitation (as compared to 50 Hz) are due to the physical
process of discharge. Electron avalanche after any discharge
results in a significant amount of spare positive space charge,
which accumulates adjacent to the tip electrode. They will
recombine with free electrons when the voltage changes its
polarity. Now, if the frequency of applied excitation is
sufficiently high, the slow mobile space charge gets shorter
time to collide with free electrons and recombine. In essence,
during a new voltage cycle, a significant amount of these
charges from PD events of the previous cycle fails to
disappear but shows a tendency to accumulate in the proximity
to tip region with the increasing time. Hence during the
negative half-cycle, the local electric field around the pointed
electrode is significantly influenced by the leftover charges
and tends to reduce as time progresses. On the contrary, at
VLF, the longer period allows these space ions to recombine
with electrons; therefore, it is less likely for positive ions from
the previous cycle to stay present. Indeed, this is the factor
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Research Council (ARC) for financial support and Mr. Zhenyu
Liu for experimental assistance.
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