2020 International Conference on Power Electronics & IoT Applications in Renewable Energy and its Control (PARC)
GLA University, Mathura, UP, India. Feb 28-29, 2020
Development of Intelligent Automatic Electronic
MCB and ELCB Using Fault Diagnosis Technique
2020 International Conference on Power Electronics & IoT Applications in Renewable Energy and its Control (PARC) 978-1-7281-6575-2/20/$31.00 ©2020 IEEE 10.1109/PARC49193.2020.236623
Mihir Rameshkumar Vasavada
Electrical Engineering,
L.D. College of Engineering L.D. College of Engineering
Gujarat Technological University Gujarat Technological University
Ahmedabad, India
mihir75@gmail.com, patelvishwa.ee@gmail.com,
Abstract— Protection system and continuous power supply
are important for residential and commercial areas. To ensure
enhanced protection, automatically operated intelligent
miniature circuit breaker (MCB) and earth leakage circuit
breaker (ELCB) is developed using advanced current
measurement and fault diagnosis technique. Whenever short
circuit or earth fault occurs the system will trip and power
supply is if it is temporary fault system will restore power
supply using advanced fault diagnosis technique and if it is
permanent fault it will remain off. Thus, the aim of this paper
is to develop an intelligent protection system to overcome
problems of electromechanical circuit breakers. The automatic
system is able to detect, diagnose, interrupt and reclose the
circuit breaker in order to ensure power supply continuity
along with safety.
Keywords— Hall-effect transducer; Earth leakage circuit
breaker(ELCB); Miniature circuit breaker(MCB); Solid-state
relay; Fault diagnosis system; Auto-recloser system
I. INTRODUCTION
The uninterruptible power supply is essential in electrical
distribution system at domestic residential areas, corporate
buildings, hospitals, labs and all kinds of emergency
services. For protection from short circuit fault and earth
faults, these miniature circuit breaker (MCB) and earth
leakage circuit breaker (ELCB) are used respectively. Due to
short circuit equipment failure and fire hazard takes place
and earth fault cause shock hazard to human life. In India
installation of earth leakage circuit breaker has been
mandatory under section 61 A of the Indian Electricity
Rules, 1956 for all new connections of 5KW, but awareness
of earth leakage circuit breaker(ELCB) is still less, that cause
a shock hazard. Workplace accidents report nearly 13
electrocution deaths on an average per day India. This is the
highest in the world. The annual average electric related
deaths in the United Kingdom and the United States are 8
and 82 respectively [9]. Delhi(424), Mumbai(418) and
Ahmedabad(260) are recorded the highest number of a short
circuit in India during a decade [10].
The existing system do not protect against the
overheating which occurs due to improper screwing of
conductors into their terminals. This can also be avoided by
using thermal sensors integrated onto the electronic circuit
breaker. Also, the conventional mechanical MCB and ELCB
boards can be fitted with sensors through which we can
individually monitor the conditions in each part of the house
Aarambh Cell, LDCE, Student Startup and Innovation Policy,
Educational Department, Government of Gujarat.
978-1-7281-6575-2/20/$31.00 ©2020 IEEE
Authorized licensed use limited to: Univ of Calif Santa Barbara. Downloaded on May 16,2020 at 02:39:52 UTC from IEEE Xplore. Restrictions apply.
Vishwa S. Patel Jay R. Prajapati
Electrical Engineering, Electrical Engineering, L.D. College of
Engineering
Gujarat Technological University
Ahmedabad, India Ahmedabad, India
prajapatijayr98@gmail.com
so that even a normal person can be able to understand as to
what has happened with the circuit breaker [7]. The new
energy management system or smart-grid was introduced
into the power system. The management system of
generation, transmission and demand side were controlled
under the concept of bidirectional power and bidirectional
communication system. The smart protection device is also
integrated into smart-grid for improving the novel power
system protection [4].
In domestic premises, there are two major faults
occurring short circuits and earth fault. Short circuit fault
occurs due to a tremendous increase in line current, while
earth leakage fault occurs due to leakage current from a line
to earth directly or indirectly. Existing MCB works on the
principle of heating and bending of Bi-metallic strip which
releases mechanical latch and ELCB works on detection of
current between line and neutral wire using a current
transformer. Both of existing systems have the manual
operation and use of the electromechanical system, while
intelligent electronic circuit breaker works on the principle of
hall-effect transducer and advanced fault diagnosis-technique
[11].
II. WORKING PRINCIPLE
Existing Circuit Breakers are electromechanical circuit
breakers while Intelligent Protection System consists of
electronic circuit breaker. Electronic circuit breaker makes
use of current sensors, microcontroller, solid state relay,
voltage transformer, BJTs and rectifier. Electronic circuit
breaker detects over current and leakage current using hall-
effect transducers, Fault detection and diagnosis works on
small supply injection technique, tripping and reclosing
mechanism works on solid state technology. Automatic
intelligent protection system works as per user requirements.
If the current difference in line and neutral exceeds 30mA for
domestic application and 100milliamperes for industrial
application circuit interruption takes place [1]. If the
response of the fault diagnosis system is the occurrence of a
temporary fault, then the circuit will get automatically
reclose as soon as temporary fault removed. The system will
not reclose the circuit if it detects permanent fault using a
small supply injection technique. Microcontroller fetches
data from current sensors continuously, process the data,
sends signals to relaying mechanism and take decisions as
per given instruction sets. The block diagram in Fig.1 shows
data flow and working of overall system.
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 minimum 5 milliamperes accuracy. Hence, external ADC is
used in the circuit. ADS1115 has a 16-bit resolution that
means it can measure 65535th part of 5 V that is 0.125
millivolts. Hence, it can measure 1.89 milliamperes current
precisely.
The output of ACS 724 is pure sinusoidal in nature hence
no harmonics are present. 65.76 millivolts RMS or 92.95
millivolts peak output can be obtained when there is 1 A
RMS supply current is flowing. This can be also seen in Fig.
Fig. 1. Functional Block Diagram 3 along with Fig. 4

III. SYSTEM OPERATION B. Condition Monitoring

Automatic Intelligent Protection System consists of four Measured data of current is continuously fed to micro-
major subsystems as following: controller endurance arduino nano ATMEGA328. This
provides better running characteristics, low power
A) Current Measurement System consumption, RISC architecture, fully static operation at 16
megahertz. It contains volatile memory segment, internally
B) Condition Monitoring System calibrated oscillator and having high endurance. Device
C) Fault Detection and Diagnosis System condition and control can be accessible by a user directly
through IOT. Condition is to be monitored by a user via
D) Tripping and Auto-reclosing System GSM Module/ Bluetooth Module/ Wifi Networks. Alert
A. Current Measurement System message is sent to the user on the occurrence of the fault and
response of the system is available to the user. In case of any
Current measurement can be done by using a current
hazard, the user can also directly control the device to
transformer, series resistor, hall-effect transducer, mirror
prevent further damages. IOT technology makes device more
matched transistors. Out of this hall-effect transducer gives
user friendly for future smart homes. [5]. Data flow in
best results suitable for electronic circuit breaker application.
overall system is shown in flowchart in Fig.5.
Two ACS 724 are used to an accurate and precise
measurement of current in phase and neutral. ACS 724
provides low primary conductor resistance, low power loss.
No shielding is required because sensor rejects common
mode field successfully [12]. This can be used for
measurement of AC and DC current in industrial,
automotive, commercial and domestic application
economically. This IC sense current differentially using hall-
effect transducer in order to reject the common-mode field
and improve accuracy in a noisy environment. It can measure
precisely up to 1.9 milliamperes and can operate within 4
milliseconds. For domestic applications module of 30 A is to
be used. For getting the accurate results from hall-effect
transducer filter pin of the sensor must be connected with the
capacitors in the configuration as shown in Fig. 2.
Fig. 3. The waveform of ACS 724

Fig. 2. IC ACS 724 Configuration

Arduino has inbuilt 10-bit ADC that means it can

measure 1023rd part of 5 Volt i.e. 4.9 millivolts ACS 724 30
A has a sensitivity of 66 millivolts per ampere so that it can
measure only 74 milliamperes current precisely. This is not Fig. 4. Cursor values of Fig. 3.
sufficient for accurate measurement. Hence it cannot be
implemented in earth leakage circuit breaker that requires

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Fig. 5. Flowchart of signals
C. Fault detection and diagnosis system
Electronic Circuit Breaker detect overcurrent and earth
fault very fast. This will trip the circuit if a fault is detected.
For reclosing application it uses small supply injection
technique to check whether the fault is removed or not. From
the input side of this module step down transformer is
connected for lower voltage injection in the system. If still
there is a difference of current between line and neutral, the
system is in a faulty condition. Hence, it remains off. But if
there is no difference between line and neutral current,
System is in healthy condition and it will on the breaker.
The calculation for current during small supply injection
is performed in an experimental case for 230 V system. At
the time of earth fault, 30 milliamperes leakage current is
measured then there is virtual resistance of 7.6 kiloohms. For
small supply, 12 V injection 1.8 milliamperes current is to be
tripped if detected.
Faults due to overcurrent and insulation failure are a
permanent fault. In such cases, the breaker will trip
permanently. Transient faults are temporary fault due to
which nuisance tripping occurs.
The system can identify such faults successfully and it
will make system on automatically once it is removed.
D. Tripping and Reclosing Mechanism
For opening and closing of lines, solid-state relays are
used as a switch. Solid-state relay consist of various circuit
elements which are connected to each other as shown in Fig.
6.
Fig. 6. Schematic of the solid-state relay
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The microcontroller sends signals to relays as per system
condition. On the occurrence of the fault immediately relay
operates and trip the circuit. Ultra fast relay works in very
less time to isolate a faulty part of the system and avoid any
damages. From the results of fault diagnosis system
microcontroller sends a signal to relay to remain permanently
off in case of a permanent fault. If the response of a fault
diagnosis system is an identification of temporary fault then
the signal is sent to the reclosing system and lines are closed
to ensure the reliability of power supply. The typical
sequence for auto-recloser operation of a large power circuit
breaker is shown in Fig. 7. [8]. Similar system works for
domestic auto-recloser.
Use of these relays makes system very effective,
economical, fast dynamic response, less operation time, high
voltage and current withstand capability. Calculation of
tripping time is performed for the proposed system. ACS 724
works at 120 kHz frequency, it means that it works in 8
microseconds. Arduino nano works at 16 megahertz that it
works in 0.0625 microseconds and solid-state relay work in
7.5 milliseconds. Hence overall system is ultra fast acting
whose time response is 8 milliseconds. It also can withstand
high di/dt and dv/dt. There are no contact failures, No arc
noise, very little noise generation during operation [2],[6].
The solid-state relay consists of triac, optocoupler,
snubber circuit. All movable mechanical parts are absent.
The optocoupler is used for firing triac at the desired instant
of time.
Fig. 7. Operation of auto-recloser
 IV. CIRCUIT DESCRIPTION TABLE II. COMPARISON BETWEEN MECHANICAL CIRCUIT BREAKER
AND ELECTRONIC CIRCUIT BREAKER
The circuit is operated at single phase 230 V supply.
Features Mechanical circuit Electronic circuit
Circuit diagram consists of two solid state relays, ACS 724, breaker breaker
step down transformer 230V/12 V , Diode bridge Rectifier Auto-reclosing Not Available Available
for 12 V AC to 12V DC, Voltage regulator of 5 V. Arduino Life span 2-3 years 4-5 years
ATMEGA328 are used as a mircrocontroller in the circuit. Nuisance tripping Yes No
Lamp Load of 100 W is connected as a load for simulation of IOT compatible No Yes
the circuit. During actual set up various other loads are to be Trip unit Technology Thermal-Magnetic Solid state technology
connected to check the performance of the system under Fault Diagnosis Not possible Possible
Size of device Bulky Compact
different cases. According to the used circuit element this
Arcing Present Absent
intelligent protection system can be used for the system Operation noise High Low
parameters that are specified in table I. Hardware kit is Maintenance Regularly Very less
shown in Fig. 8. The circuit diagram and modelling of Requirement
Intelligent Protection system is shown in Fig. 9.

TABLE I. SYSTEM PARAMETERS

System Quantities Values
Voltage Level 250 V
Load 5000 W
Short Circuit Current >25 A
Earth Leakage Current >30 milliamperes

Table II shows the comparison between the existing

system and proposed system. It is clear that ultra fast-acting
Intelligent Protection System have better performance than
the existing system [6].

Fig. 8. Hardware Image of Intelligent Portection System

Fig. 9. Modelled Circuit Diagram of Intelligent Protection system

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 V. CONCLUSION
Intelligent Protection System consisting of Electronic
Circuit Breaker and auto-reclosing system considered as a
novel solution for domestic protection system for smart
home. This system removes drawbacks of mechanically
operated circuit breakers. Development of auto reclosing
electronic MCBs and ELCBs enhances the performance and
reliability of the protection system.From experimental
results it can be concluded that proposed system is robust,
having ultra fast tripping mechanism, stable operating point,
low power consumption, accurate, automatic operation,
longer life and economy that can be used for smart home in
the future.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This research is supported by Aarambh Cell, L.D.
College of Engineering, Student Startup and Innovation
Policy, Educational Department, Government of Gujarat. We
are thankful to our colleagues from Department of Electrical
Engineering, L.D. College of Engineering who provided
insight and expertise that greatly assisted the research.
We are thankful to Mitul Patel, Assistant Professor, L.D.
College of Engineering for assistance with technical support
in hardware building and continuous mentoring. We are also
thankful to Prof. Adhwaryu Vaishali Apurva and Prof. Hiral
Raval, Assistant Professors, L.D. College of Engineering for
comments on an earlier version of manuscript that greatly
improved the manuscript.
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