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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY
On Possible Influence of Corona Discharge on the
Propagation Speed of Lightning Surges
Along a Tall Grounded Object
Takuro Okada, Yoshihiro Baba , Fellow, IEEE, Thang Huu Tran, Member, IEEE,
and Vladimir A. Rakov , Fellow, IEEE
Abstract—In this article, we present a sensitivity analysis to
show under what conditions corona on vertical conductors may
become significant. A lightning strike to a 600-m-tall grounded
metallic object (tower) on a perfectly conducting ground is simu-
lated using the 2-D finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method
in the cylindrical coordinate system and taking into account corona
discharge from the lateral surface of the object. The tall object is
represented by a cylinder having a radius of 0.1, 1, or 5 m (these
values are representative of tower top, not the entire tower), where
the extent of radial corona is most significant. The corona discharge
is represented by a radially expanding higher conductivity region
around the tall object. The corona radius is largest (up to about
5 m) at the object top with no corona at its bottom. It follows from
the FDTD simulations that the wavefront of lightning current surge
can be distorted significantly and the apparent propagation speed
can be reduced. The reduction in propagation speed becomes more
significant as the magnitude of lightning current increases.
Index Terms—Corona discharge, FDTD method, lightning
surge, propagation speed, tall strike object.
I. INTRODUCTION
N THE analysis of electromagnetic fields and/or surges
I associated with lightning strikes to tall grounded objects,
the propagation speed of lightning current wave along the tall
object is usually assumed to be equal to the speed of light [1].
However, in the case of corona discharge on the lateral surface of
the strike object, the apparent current-propagation speed may be
lower. According to [2], the radiation field peak is proportional to
the sum of the current propagation speed along the return-stroke
channel and that along the tall strike object. Therefore, corona
discharge can potentially influence electromagnetic fields pro-
duced by lightning strikes to tall objects. To the best of our
Manuscript received February 1, 2020; revised March 23, 2020 and April 26,
2020; accepted May 14, 2020. This work was supported by the Japan Society
for the Promotion of Science under Grant 18K04113. (Corresponding author:
Yoshihiro Baba.)
Takuro Okada and Yoshihiro Baba are with the Department of Elec-
trical Engineering, Doshisha University, Kyoto 610–0394, Japan (e-mail:
ctwc0350@mail4.doshisha.ac.jp; ybaba@mail.doshisha.ac.jp).
Thang Huu Tran is with the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineer-
ing, National Institute of Technology, Tsuruoka College, Yamagata 997-8511,
Japan (e-mail: thangth@tsuruoka-nct.ac.jp).
Vladimir A. Rakov is with the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611 USA (e-mail:
rakov@ece.ufl.edu).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this article are available online
at https://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TEMC.2020.2995311
0018-9375 © 2020 IEEE. Personal use is permitted, but republication/redistribution requires IEEE permission.
See https://www.ieee.org/publications/rights/index.html for more information.
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1
knowledge, influence of corona discharge on the propagation
speed of lightning current wave along a tall strike object has not
been quantified yet.
While the effect of corona on horizontal conductors is well
known and has been extensively studied via both experiments
and modeling, corona on vertical grounded conductors is usually
assumed absent or negligible. The latter assumption is probably
valid for relatively short (tens of meters or less) vertical objects
but not necessarily for objects whose height is measured in
hundreds of meters. Note that there are several towers/masts
with heights greater than 600 m or between 500 and 600 m.
Examples of such towers include the Tokyo Skytree in Japan, the
Shanghai Tower and the Canton Tower in China, the KVLY-TV
mast in the United States (North Dakota), the CN Tower in
Canada, and the Ostankino Tower in Russia. In this study, we
did not try to represent the actual geometry of any of these
structures, limiting ourselves only to a sensitivity analysis to
show under what conditions corona on vertical conductors may
become significant.
In this paper, a lightning strike to a 600-m-tall object on a
perfectly conducting ground is simulated using the 2-D finite-
difference time-domain (FDTD) method [3] in the cylindrical
coordinate system with corona discharge on the tall-object sur-
face being taken into account. The tall object is represented
by a cylinder having a radius of 0.1, 1, or 5 m. Note that our
assumed radii are representative of tower tops (not the entire
tower), where the extent of radial corona is most significant. The
corona discharge is represented by a radially expanding higher
conductivity region around the tall object, as done in [4] for rep-
resenting corona discharge from a horizontal power-line conduc-
tor. The validity of the corona representation is examined in the
Appendix through a comparison with the measured waveforms
of high-voltage surges on a horizontal overhead conductor [5].
II. MODELING
A. Corona Discharge
The radial progression of corona streamers, whose conduc-
tivity is higher than that of undisturbed air, from the surface
of tall grounded object is represented by the radial expansion
of cylindrical conducting region. The critical electric field E0
on the surface of cylindrical conductor for initiation of corona
discharge is given by Hartmann equation (1984) [6], which is
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2 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

reproduced below
 
0.1269
E0 = m · 2.594 × 106 1 + 0.4346 [V/m] (1)
r0
where r0 is the radius of the conductor (grounded vertical tall
object in our case), m is a coefficient depending on the conductor
surface condition. Note that this coefficient was not employed
by Hartmann [6], but was later introduced by Guillier et al.
(1995) [7]. Equation (1) was derived for the normal conditions
(pressure p = 760 Torr, temperature t = 20 °C, and humidity H
= 11 g/m3 ). In this paper, we assumed that m = 0.5. For r0 =
0.1, 0.5, and 1 m, E0 = 1.74, 1.52, and 1.46 MV/m, respectively.
The critical background electric fields (absolute values) that
are necessary for streamer propagation [8] and, hence, determine
the maximum extent of the radially expanding corona region for
positive, Ecp , and negative, Ecn , polarity are set, following [9],
as:
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of (a) corona onset and (b) corona expansion in the
Ecp = 0.5 MV/m , Ecn = 1.5 MV/m (2) 2-D FDTD simulations.

If the FDTD-computed radial electric field, Ern , at time step

n and at a point closest to the surface of the tall object exceeds
E0 , the conductivity of σ cor = 40 μS/m is assigned to the cell
closest to the surface of the conducting object with a time delay,
computed as Δr/vc (Δr is the cell side length in the radial
direction and vc is the average corona expansion speed). If the
magnitude of FDTD-computed radial electric field, Ern , at time
step n and at a point located on the outer surface of corona
region exceeds Ecp for positive or Ecn for negative polarity, the
40-μS/m conducting region is expanded with a time delay of
Δr/vc . This step-like expansion of conducting region with a
time delay of Δr/vc per each step simulates the corona expan-
sion with the average speed of vc . If the FDTD-computed radial
electric field, Ern , at time step n and at a point which is located
on the outer surface of corona region falls below Ecp for positive
or Ecn for negative polarity, the 40-μS/m conducting region is
diminished. Onset/expansion and shrinking/extinction of corona
are schematically illustrated in Figs. 1 and 2, respectively. Note Fig. 2. Schematic diagram of (a) corona shrinking and (b) corona extinction
that the conductivity of 40 μS/m is selected to reproduce the in the FDTD simulations.
measured charge-voltage characteristics and measured corona-
distorted voltage waveforms with the simplified corona model,
which is described in [4], [10] and in the Appendix of this paper.
In this paper, the expansion speed of corona discharge is
set to 1.0 × 106 m/s. Note that speed values ranging from
0.3 × 106 to 2 × 106 m/s (for applied voltages of 300–500
kV) were inferred from modeling in [11]. Cabrera and Cooray
[12] reported a value of speed for radial corona streamers from
conductors of about 105 m/s for negative polarity. Heckman and
Williams [13] gave the same value (105 m/s) as characteristic for
positive corona streamers. The largest reported value of speed
for positive streamers is 4.4 × 106 m/s [14]. Note that the corona
expansion speed or delay was not taken into account in [4] since
the injected current was relatively low (less than about 1 kA).

B. Tall Grounded Object Struck by Lightning

Fig. 3 shows an idealized 600-m-tall grounded object struck Fig. 3. FDTD simulation model of a lightning strike to a 600-m-tall vertical
cylinder.
by lightning to be analyzed using the FDTD method. The object

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OKADA et al.: ON POSSIBLE INFLUENCE OF CORONA DISCHARGE ON THE PROPAGATION SPEED OF LIGHTNING SURGES 3

is represented by a vertical cylinder having a conductivity of

107 S/m. Three different cylinder radii, r0 = 0.1, 1, and 5
m, are considered. The lightning channel is represented by a
vertical perfectly conducting wire having a radius of 0.0135 m
( = 0.135 × 0.1 m) [15]. A lumped voltage source is inserted
between the grounded object and the lightning channel. The
output waveform of this voltage source is represented by the
Heidler function [16] with 1-μs risetime, and its magnitude is
adjusted to make the first peak of tall-object top current (before
the arrival of ground reflected current wave) equal to I = 10, 50,
and 100 kA. Note that the current having a risetime of 1 μs and
a magnitude of 100 kA corresponds to the waveform of negative
first stroke recommended by [17] (for Lightning Protection
Level I). The computational domain was 600 m × 6000 m,
which was divided uniformly into 0.1 m × 1 m cells. The axis of
both the lightning channel and the grounded object is located at
the left-side boundary of this 2-D computational domain. Liao’s
second-order absorbing boundary condition [18] is applied to
the top, bottom, and right-side boundaries. In this paper, the
ground conductivity is set to  (perfectly conducting ground)
for the following reason. Lossy ground would lead to attenuation
and distortion of ground-reflected current, which would make
it difficult to identify the attenuation and distortion of current
caused exclusively by corona. Note that corona discharge is
allowed to occur only on the lateral surface of the grounded
object.
Fig. 4 shows waveforms of current at the top, middle point,
and bottom of 600-m tall object having a radius of 1 m for 10-,
50-, and 100-kA currents, computed without corona discharge
on the object. It appears from Fig. 4 that, as expected, a current
wave is attenuated as it propagates along the vertical conductor
even when no corona discharge is considered [19]: for example, Fig. 4. Waveforms of current at the top (600 m), middle point (300 m),
in Fig. 4(a), the current magnitude at the bottom is not 20 but and bottom (0 m) of a 600-m-tall object having a radius of 1 m for
17.5 kA for the 10-kA current injection at the top of the cylinder (a) 10-kA, (b) 50-kA, and (c) 100-kA injected currents, in the absence of corona.
(25% reduction).
almost the same as those computed without considering corona
(not shown here).
III. ANALYSIS AND RESULTS
Table I provides values of the apparent propagation speed of
In this section, we present the simulation results obtained lightning current wave along the 600-m-tall object, which are
taking into account corona on the grounded strike object. evaluated from the propagation time from the top to the bottom
of the object, a distance of 600 m. We have employed three
different methods to monitor the arrival of current wave: 10%,
A. Positive Lighting Current 50%, and 90% of the peak. The propagation speed of current
Fig. 5 shows waveforms of current at the top, middle point, wave decreases with increasing the radius of the conductor
and bottom of 600-m-tall object having a radius of 1 m for and increasing the wave-arrival monitoring percentage-of-peak
positive 10, 50, and 100-kA currents. Note that positive cur- value, even when no corona is considered. When the object
rent corresponds to the transfer of positive charge to ground. radius is 0.1 or 1 m, the wave propagation speed appreciably
It appears from Figs. 4 and 5 that the current wave suffers decreases with increasing current peak if the wave arrival is
appreciable attenuation due to positive corona discharge for monitored as the 90% of peak point on the current front (about
injected currents of 50 and 100 kA (about 40% and 45% overall 25% or 10% reduction for a 100 kA positive current and 0.1-m-
reduction, respectively, vs. 25% in the case of no corona), but or 1-m-radius object, respectively). On the other hand, when the
not for the 10-kA current (25% reduction, which is the same as object radius is 5 m, the wave propagation speed is very little
the reduction in the case of no corona). influenced by the current magnitude, even for current peaks of
Fig. 6 is the same as Fig. 5(c), but for the strike object having 200 kA and higher (not shown here). The threshold currents,
a radius of 5 m. In this case, essentially no corona is generated defined here as the current below which the effect of corona is
even for a 100-kA injected current, except for some limited part negligible (the reduction of current propagation speed based on
near the top (see Fig. 9), and, therefore, current waveforms are the wave arrival time of the 90% of the peak point is less than

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4 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

(a)

(b)

Fig. 7. Time-variation of corona radius at heights of (a) 600 m and (b) 300 m
for 1-m-radius strike object and positive currents having peaks of 10, 50, and 50
kA.

Fig. 5. Waveforms of current at the top (600 m), middle point (300 m),
and bottom (0 m) of a 600-m-tall strike object having a radius of 1 m for
(a) positive 10-kA, (b) positive 50-kA, and (c) positive 100-kA injected currents.

Fig. 6. Same as Fig. 5(c), but for the strike object having a radius of 5 m.

about 5%), are 5.4 and 36 kA for objects having radii of 0.1 and
1 m, respectively. For larger (more realistic) strike-object radii,
the effect of corona is likely to be negligible, even for extremely
high lightning currents.
Fig. 7 shows of corona radius as a function of time at heights of
600 and 300 m for a 1-m-radius conductor and positive currents Fig. 8. Spatial distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-
having peaks of 10, 50, and 50 kA. radius strike object at 1, 2, and 3 µs for positive (a) 10-kA, (b) 50-kA, and
(c) 100-kA currents.
Fig. 8 shows spatial distributions of corona radius along the
600-m-tall and 1-m-radius conductor at 1, 2, and 3 μs for positive

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OKADA et al.: ON POSSIBLE INFLUENCE OF CORONA DISCHARGE ON THE PROPAGATION SPEED OF LIGHTNING SURGES
TABLE I
APPARENT SPEEDS [IN M/µS] OF POSITIVE CURRENT WAVE PROPAGATING
ALONG A 600-M-TALL CYLINDRICAL CONDUCTOR WITH CORONA ON ITS
SURFACE, DEPENDING ON THE CONDUCTOR RADIUS, THE CURRENT PEAK,
AND THE WAVE ARRIVAL MONITORING METHODS (10%, 50%, AND 90% OF
PEAK POINTS ON THE CURRENT FRONT). ALSO GIVEN ARE SPEED VALUES FOR
THE CASE OF NO CORONA
Fig. 9. Same as Fig. 8 (c), but for the 5-m-radius object.
(a) 10-kA, (b) 50-kA, and (c) 100-kA currents. Fig. 9 shows
spatial distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and
5-m-radius conductor at 1, 2, and 3 μs for a positive 100-kA
current. Note that the corona radius shown in Figs 8 is the radial
distance from the axis of the tall object to the corona-expanding
front (thus, the object radius is included).
It follows from Figs. 7 and 8 that the corona expansion is
limited by the specified corona expansion speed: 1 × 106 m/s,
which makes corona expand only 1 m per 1 μs even when a
significant radial electric field is present. Clearly, the corona
radius is largest near the object top, where the impulse voltage
is applied between the object and the lightning-representing
vertical conductor, and the radial electric field is highest. No
radial corona can develop at the bottom of the object, due to the
presence of perfectly conducting ground.
B. Negative Lightning Current
Fig. 10 shows waveforms of current at the top, middle point,
and bottom of 600-m-tall object having a radius of 1 m for
negative10-kA, 50-kA, and 100-kA currents. It appears from
comparison of Figs. 4 and 10 that the current wave suffers
appreciable attenuation due to negative corona discharge for
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5
Fig. 10. Waveforms of current at the top (600 m), middle point (300 m), and
bottom (0 m) of a 600-m-tall strike object having a radius of 1 m for (a) negative
10-kA, (b) negative 50-kA, and (c) negative 100-kA currents.
currents of 50 and 100 kA (about 40% and 45% overall re-
duction, respectively, vs. 25% in the case of no corona), but
not for the 10-kA current (25% reduction, which is the same as
the reduction in the case of no corona). Also, it appears from
comparison of Figs. 5 and 10 that the waveforms computed for
negative currents are almost the same as those computed for
positive currents.
Table II gives values of the apparent propagation speed of
negative lightning current wave along the 600-m-tall object,
which is almost the same as Table I for positive currents.
Fig. 11 shows time-variations of corona radius at heights of
600 and 300 m along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-radius conductor
for negative currents having peaks of 10, 50, and 50 kA, which
is almost the same as Fig. 7, except for the decrease of corona
radius after about 3 μs for 50-kA current. Fig. 12 shows spatial
distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-
radius conductor at 1, 2, and 3 μs for negative (a) 10-kA, (b) 50-
kA, and (c) 100-kA currents, which is almost the same as Fig. 8.
The reason for the small difference in computed current wave-
forms and propagation speeds between positive and negative
corona discharges is that the corona expansion speed in both
cases is limited to 1.0 × 106 m/s. For objects having radii of
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6 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY
Fig. 11. Time variation of corona radius at heights of (a) 600 m and (b) 300
m along a 600-m-tall and 1-m-radius object for negative currents having peaks
of 10, 50, and 100 kA.
Fig. 12. Spatial distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-
radius object at 1, 2, and 3 µs for negative (a) 10-kA, (b) 50-kA, and (c) 100-kA
currents.
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TABLE II
APPARENT SPEEDS [IN M/µS] OF NEGATIVE CURRENT WAVE PROPAGATING
ALONG A 600-M-TALL CYLINDRICAL CONDUCTOR WITH CORONA ON ITS
SURFACE, DEPENDING ON THE CONDUCTOR RADIUS, THE CURRENT PEAK,
AND THE WAVE ARRIVAL MONITORING METHODS (10%, 50%, AND 90% OF
PEAK POINTS ON THE CURRENT FRONT). ALSO GIVEN ARE SPEED VALUES
FOR THE CASE OF NO CORONA.
(a)
(b)
Fig. 13. Waveforms of current at the top (600 m), middle point (300 m), and
bottom (0 m) of a 600-m-high and 1-m-radius strike object for a positive 50-kA
current for corona expansion speeds of (a) 0.5 ×106 m/s and (b) 2 × 106 m/s.
0.1 and 1 m, the threshold currents above which the influence of
corona becomes appreciable are 7.3 and 39 kA, respectively.
C. Influence of Corona Expansion Speed
In the preceding subsections, we set the corona expansion
speed to 1.0 × 106 m/s. In this subsection, we investigate the
influence of the corona expansion speed.
Fig. 13 shows waveforms of current at different heights along
the 600-m-tall object having a radius of 1 m for a positive 50-kA
current. In the simulations, the corona expansion speed is set to
0.5 × 106 m/s (0.5 m per μs) or 2 × 106 m/s (2 m per μs). Table III
gives apparent speeds of positive 50-kA current wave propagat-
ing along a 600-m-tall cylindrical conductor of 1-m radius for
different corona expansion speeds and wave arrival monitoring
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OKADA et al.: ON POSSIBLE INFLUENCE OF CORONA DISCHARGE ON THE PROPAGATION SPEED OF LIGHTNING SURGES 7

TABLE III
APPARENT SPEEDS [IN M/µS] OF POSITIVE 50-KA CURRENT WAVE
PROPAGATING ALONG A 600-M-TALL CYLINDRICAL CONDUCTOR OF RADIUS 1
M, DEPENDING ON THE CORONA EXPANSION SPEED, AND THE WAVE ARRIVAL
MONITORING METHODS (10%, 50%, AND 90% OF PEAK POINTS ON THE
CURRENT FRONT)

Fig. 15. Waveforms of current at the top (600 m), middle point (300 m), and
bottom (0 m) of a 600-m-high and 1-m-radius strike object for a positive 50-kA
current having risetimes of (a) 0.5 µs and (b) 2 µs. The corona expansion speed
is set to 1 ×106 m/s.
Fig. 14. Spatial distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-
radius object at 1, 2, and 3 µs for a positive 50-kA current for corona expansion
speeds of (a) 0.5 ×106 m/s and (b) 2 × 106 m/s.

TABLE IV
APPARENT SPEEDS [IN M/µS] OF POSITIVE 50-KA CURRENT WAVE
PROPAGATING ALONG A 600-M-TALL CYLINDRICAL CONDUCTOR OF RADIUS 1
M, DEPENDING ON THE CURRENT RISETIME, AND THE WAVE ARRIVAL
MONITORING METHODS (10%, 50%, AND 90% OF PEAK POINTS ON THE
CURRENT FRONT)

methods. Fig. 14 shows distributions of corona radius at 1, 2,
and 3 μs.
D. Influence of Current Risetime
In the preceding subsections, we set the current risetime to
1.0 μs. In this subsection, we investigate the influence of current
risetime.
Fig. 15 shows waveforms of current at different heights along
the 600-m-tall object having a radius of 1 m for a positive
50-kA current. In the simulations, the current risetime is set
to 0.5 μs or 2 μs. Table IV gives apparent speeds of positive
50-kA current wave propagating along a 600-m-tall cylindrical
conductor of 1-m radius for different current risetimes and
wave arrival monitoring methods. Fig. 16 shows distributions
of corona radius at 1, 2, and 3 μs.
Fig. 16. Spatial distributions of corona radius along the 600-m-tall and 1-m-
radius object at 1, 2, and 3 µs for a positive 50-kA current having risetimes of
(a) 0.5 µs and (b) 2 µs.
IV. CONCLUSION
A lightning strike to an idealized 600-m-tall object on a
perfectly conducting ground has been simulated using the 2-D
FDTD method in the cylindrical coordinate system with radial
corona discharge from the lateral surface of the object taken
into account. The corona discharge is represented by the radi-
ally expanding low-conductivity region around the object. The
corona radius is largest (up to about 5 m) at the object top with
no corona at its bottom. It follows from the FDTD simulations
that by the action of corona the wavefront of lightning current
can be significantly distorted and the apparent propagation speed
can be reduced: for example, for a positive 50-kA current, the
speed along the object having a radius of 0.1 or 1 m is reduced
to 70% or 80% of c (the speed of light). The reduction in current

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8 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY

Fig. 17. 2-D-cylindrical model (not to scale) of a conductor system simulating

the experiment of Inoue [5] who studied propagation of high-voltage-impulse
waves along a 1.4-km conductor 22.2 m above ground.

propagation speeds becomes more significant as the magnitude

of lightning current increases. Other influencing factors include
the corona expansion speed, thickness (radius) of the object,
and current risetime. For realistic strike-object radii, the effect
of corona is likely to be negligible, even for extremely high
lighting currents.

APPENDIX
In this Appendix, we test the validity of the simplified corona
model used in this paper by comparing the waveforms of voltage
surge propagating along a 1.4-km overhead wire above a flat
ground, computed using the FDTD method including the corona
model, with those measured by Inoue [5]. The experimental
configuration of Inoue is approximately represented by a model
in the cylindrical coordinate system shown in Fig. 17.
The radial electric field E (r) on the surface of a cylindrical
conductor with radius r, which is located at height h above flat
ground and is uniformly charged with Q coulomb per meter
along the conductor axis, is given as Fig. 18. FDTD-computed voltage waveforms and corresponding mea-
sured ones [5] at distances of (a) 0 m, (b) 350 m, (c) 700 m, and
Q Q (d) 1050 m from the source.
E (r) = + . (A1)
2πε0 r 2πε0 (2h − r)
On the other hand, the radial electric field E (r) is given by In Fig. 17, a cylindrical conductor has a length of 1.4 km,
which represents the 1.4-km-long overhead horizontal wire in
Q
E (r) = . (A2) Inoue’s experiment. It is connected at the top with a 30-m-thick
2πε0 r conducting medium through a 490-Ω matching resistor and a
If r is much smaller than h, which is the condition satisfied disk electrode having a radius of 10 m and a thickness of 10 m
in the present configuration, (A2) is a good approximation to and at the bottom with a 30-m thick conducting medium through
(A1), and the difference between (A1) and (A2) is negligible. a voltage source and a disk electrode having a radius of 10 m
Therefore, the validity of the corona model can be examined and a thickness of 10 m. The coaxial outer medium has an inner
by comparing the results computed in the 2-D cylindrical co- radius of 22.2 m, which corresponds to the height above ground
ordinate system with measured ones obtained in a nonradially- of the horizontal wire employed in Inoue’s experiment. The outer
symmetrical configuration. medium shown in green in Fig. 17 represents the ground in

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OKADA et al.: ON POSSIBLE INFLUENCE OF CORONA DISCHARGE ON THE PROPAGATION SPEED OF LIGHTNING SURGES
Inoue’s experiment, and its conductivity is set to 10 mS/m. The
conductor system is accommodated in a working space of 32.2
× 1504.4 m, which is divided uniformly in rectangular cells
of 0.01265 × 0.2 m. Liao’s absorbing boundary condition [18]
is applied to the top, right, and bottom planes of this working
space. Corona discharge, which is represented by the region with
a conductivity of σ cor = 40 μS/m, is assumed to develop only
from the cylindrical conductor.
Fig. 18 shows FDTD-computed voltage waveforms and corre-
sponding measured ones [5] at distances of 0 (voltage application
point), 350, 700, and 1050 m from the source. Waveforms com-
puted without the corona model are also shown for comparison.
Clearly, the waveforms computed with the corona model agree
well with Inoue’s measurements (in contrast with those com-
puted without corona) in support of the corona model employed
in this paper.
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Takuro Okada received the B.Sc. degree in electrical
engineering in 2018 from Doshisha University, Ky-
oto, Japan, where he is currently a graduate student.
His research interest includes computational elec-
tromagnetics.
Yoshihiro Baba (Fellow, IEEE) received the B.Sc.,
M.Sc., and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering
from the University of Tokyo, Japan, in 1994, 1996,
and 1999, respectively. In 1999, he was with Doshisha
University, Kyoto, Japan.
From April 2003 to August 2004, he was a Visiting
Scholar at the University of Florida. Since 2012, he
has been a Professor with Doshisha University. He
has authored or coauthored two books, seven book
chapters, and more than 100 papers published in
reviewed international journals. He was the recipient
of the Technical Achievement Award from the IEEE EMC Society in 2014.
Dr. Baba is the Chairperson of Technical Program Committee of the 2015
Asia-Pacific International Conference on Lightning (APL), Nagoya, Japan. He
has been the Vice Chairperson of the APL Steering Committee since 2017.
He had been the Convener of CIGRE C4.37 Working Group from 2014 until
2019. From 2009 until 2018, he was an Editor with the IEEE Transactions on
Power Delivery, and from 2018 until 2019 a Guest Associate Editor with the
IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility. He has been an Editor
of the IEEE Power Engineering Letters since 2009, and an Associate Editor
with Electrical Engineering (Springer Journal) since 2019. He is a Fellow of the
Institution of Engineering and Technology.
Thang Huu Tran (Member IEEE) received the B.S.
and M.S. degrees from the Hanoi University of Tech-
nology, Hanoi, Vietnam in 2003 and 2006, respec-
tively, and the Ph.D. degree from Doshisha Univer-
sity, Kyoto, Japan, in 2014.
From February 2005 to February 2008, he was with
the Institute of Energy, Vietnam. He is currently an
Associate Professor with the Department of Electri-
cal and Electronic Engineering, National Institute of
Technology, Tsuruoka College, Yamagata, Japan.
Vladimir A. Rakov (Fellow, IEEE) received the M.S.
and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the
Tomsk Polytechnical University (Tomsk Polytech-
nic), Tomsk, Russia, in 1977 and 1983, respectively.
From 1977 to 1979, he was an Assistant Professor
of Electrical Engineering with Tomsk Polytechnic.
In 1978, he joined the lightning research group at the
High Voltage Research Institute (a division of Tomsk
Polytechnic), where from 1984 to 1994, he was the
Director of the Lightning Research Laboratory. He is
currently a Professor in the Department of Electrical
and Computer Engineering, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA and
Co-Director of the International Center for Lightning Research and Testing
(ICLRT), FL, USA. He has authored or coauthored four books, and more than
800 other publications on various aspects of lightning, with over 300 papers
being published in reviewed journals.
Dr. Rakov is a Fellow of four major professional societies, IEEE, the American
Geophysical Union, the American Meteorological Society, and the Institution
of Engineering and Technology.