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Application Note: Distance Protection Application for Wind Farms; HITACHI

ABB POWER GRIDS

Technical Report · November 2020

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Distance Protection Application for
Wind Farms

Contents
1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................. 2

2. Problem Description ................................................................................................................... 2

2.1. Potential issue for Faulty Feeder Distance Protection ....................................................... 3
2.2. Potential issue for Healthy Feeder Distance Protection ..................................................... 3

3. Proposed Solution for Faulty Feeder ........................................................................................3

3.1. Setting for Directional Blinder in the 4th Quadrant .............................................................. 3
3.2. Using Additional Application Configuration Logic ............................................................... 4

4. Proposed Solution for Healthy Feeder .....................................................................................6

5. Alternative solution .....................................................................................................................7

5.1. Resistively grounded MV systems ..................................................................................... 7
5.2. Reactor grounded MV systems .......................................................................................... 7
5.3. Cross Country Faults .......................................................................................................... 8

6. Solution by using REL670.......................................................................................................... 8

7. Additional Information ................................................................................................................ 9

7.1. Listing of related documents .............................................................................................. 9

8. Revisions ..................................................................................................................................... 9

PREPARED STATUS SECURITY LEVEL

2020-11-16 Zoran Gajic Approved Public
APPROVED DOCUMENT KIND
2020-11-26 Hans Pettersson Application note
OWNING ORGANIZATION DOCUMENT ID REV. LANG. PAGE
2877 GA Products 1MRG501137 B en 1/9
© Hitachi ABB Power Grids. 2020. All rights reserved.

HITACHI ABB POWER GRIDS

 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

1. Introduction
Applications that would traditionally use directional overcurrent and earth fault relays now use dis-
tance protection IEDs for faster clearing times, improved security and better selectivity. The wide-
spread use of numerical IEDs has increased the application of distance protection to lower volt-
ages, including distribution and sub-transmission feeders. Many such systems may be impedance
grounded instead of solidly grounded.

Distance relays are normally applied in a step-distance scheme at any voltage level. A source of
problems for distance relays on the Wind Farm MV system is the inclusion of a current-limiting im-
pedance in the neutral of the source transformer. The voltage drop across this impedance during
earth fault conditions affects the voltages seen by the distance protection both in faulty but as well
in the healthy phases. This may also affect the polarizing voltage used by the distance relay.

Extensive use of power cables in such Wind Farm MV system increases capacitive earth fault cur-
rent component. This capacitive earth fault current component in combination with used grounding
principle might also cause a problem for traditional distance protection which is primarily designed
for protection of high voltage overhead lines in a solidly grounded power system.

Thus, distance protection in the faulty feeder but even one installed in the healthy feeders might
have difficult operating condition in Wind Farm MV systems during and earth-fault and some spe-
cial measures must be taken in order to get correct performance from distance protection.

2. Problem Description
Typical single line diagram of an offshore wind farm is presented in Figure 1.

Figure 1: Typical SLD for an offshore wind farm

The complete wind farm is connected via a grid transformer (GT) and long HV, under-water sea ca-
ble to onshore HV transmission grid. In case of an onshore windfarm GT will be connected directly
to the HV Grid. Note that this document is applicable to both types of Wind Farms.

The Wind Farm MV system, which typically operates at 33kV or 66kV level, is grounded via a neu-
tral grounding transformer (NGT) and a neutral grounding resistor (NGR). The earth fault current on
MV side is then limited to a certain value (e.g. typically in-between 600A to 2500A primary) and is
dominantly resistive in nature due to NGR and NGT sizing. However, installation sites do exist
where NGR is completely omitted and only NGT is used. In such installations this earth-fault current
component then becomes inductive in nature. For such system without NGR it is suggested to use
Alternative Solution given in Section 5.

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

Array cable feeders are going out from the Wind Farm MV bus and each of them collects power
produced by several wind turbine generators (WTG), as shown in Figure 1. Such array cable feed-
ers can be up to 40km long especially when 66kV voltage level is used. When an earth fault hap-
pens in one array cable feeder quite large capacitive ground fault current contribution from parallel
connected healthy array cable feeders will be present. This capacitive earth-fault current compo-
nent from each healthy feeder varies but in extreme cases it can be up to 100A primary per 33kV
feeder and even up to 400A primary per 66kV feeder.

2.1. Potential issue for Faulty Feeder Distance Protection

The distance protection IED, installed in the faulty feeder, will measure in the faulty phase the vec-
torial sum of the capacitive ground fault current component, resistive or inductive current compo-
nent from the NGR/NGT combination, inductive current component due to the cable phase reac-
tance to the fault point and active power export current component from the WTGs. It can be shown
[1] that the faulty phase current under such conditions may start to lead (i.e. NOT lag as expected)
the faulty phase voltage. Consequently, the measured impedance by the distance protection in the
faulty phase will actually reside in the fourth impedance quadrant. This might cause traditional
ground distance element not to declare this as a forward fault at all. Consequently, for such installa-
tions additional measures shall be taken to ensure proper behavior of ground distance directional
element for the faulty feeder.

2.2. Potential issue for Healthy Feeder Distance Protection

As the MV bus voltage level in the Wind Farms is increasing (e.g. from 33kV to 66kV) the capaci-
tive earth-fault current contribution from healthy cable array feeders will also become much larger
(e.g. up to 400A primary per feeder at 66kV depending on the length of the feeder cable sections).
Such high neutral current level in a healthy feeder during an EF somewhere else in the MV system
might cause problems for distance protection which is installed on this healthy feeder. Namely this
capacitive neutral current may have approximately the same order of magnitude as a phase load
current supplied by WTGs or be even bigger than the load current depending on the actual wind
speed. If during such operating condition zero-sequence based directionality within the distance
protection is enabled for phase-to-ground measuring loops, then distance protection may declare
such reverse fault to be in forward direction and consequently it can mal-operate.

3. Proposed Solution for Faulty Feeder

The following two sub-sections describes possible actions to improve operation of ground distance
protection in the IED [2] installed in a faulty feeder in such Wind Farm installation.

3.1. Setting for Directional Blinder in the 4th Quadrant

The Hitachi ABB Power Grids distance protection functions typically have quadrilateral operating
characteristic as shown in Figure 2. For some variants/versions of the distance protection it is pos-
sible to set the angle of the directional blinder in the fourth quadrant by changing the value for set-
ting parameter ArgDir. This parameter has default value of 15˚ as shown in black color in Figure 2.
For windfarm applications, due to reasons described above, it is advisable to increase this value to
45˚ as shown in red color in Figure 2 (i.e. this will increase the operating area for distance protec-
tion in the fourth quadrant).

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

Figure 2: Typical quadrilateral operating characteristic

However please note that this will only improve the operation of the traditional distance protection
zones. In order to verify if this is the complete solution one need to do dynamic simulations under
worst operating scenarios. Therefore, it is also strongly recommended to always implement the ap-
plication configuration solution proposed in the following section as well.

3.2. Using Additional Application Configuration Logic

During a ground-fault, only the earth fault protection installed in the faulty feeder will see the resis-
tive current component caused by the NGR. This fact can be used to enable additional directional
supervision of the distance ground element. Such supervision shall be arranged in application con-
figuration in the way as described below.

First the logic as given in Figure 3 shall be used to detect that a genuine forward earth fault has
happened in the protected feeder.

Figure 3: Logic to detect a Forward Earth Fault

The associated signals with AND gate used in Figure 3 are described in the list below:

1. “67N-STFW-EF4PTOC” signal shall come from the directional feature of the earth-fault
protection function EF4PTOC [2]. The pickup current for this directional element shall be
set to 20% of the earth fault current component determined by NGT and NGR sizing. The
RCA angle for the EF4PTOC function shall be set to 0˚ (or even to -5 in order to increase
the margin towards the capacitive EF current in the healthy feeders). This signal shall ver-
ify that a resistive earth-fault current component from the NGR is measured in the pro-
tected feeder.

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

2. “59N-SATRT-ROV2PTOV” signal shall come from the residual over-voltage function

ROV2PTOV [2]. Its pickup shall be set to 30%. This signal shall verify that a residual volt-
age is detected.

3. “Ph-Gnd 59-START-OV2PTOV” signal shall come from the phase over-voltage function
OV2PTOV [2]. This function shall be set to measure Ph-Gnd voltages. Its pickup level shall
be set to 125%. This signal shall verify that a high voltage is detected in at least one of the
three phases. During an earth fault two Ph-Gnd voltages will typically exceed this set level.

4. “Ph-Ph 27-START-UV2PTOV” signal shall come from the phase under-voltage function
OV2PTOV [2]. This function shall be set to measure Ph-Ph voltages. Its pickup level shall
be set to 75%. This signal shall verify that a low Ph-Ph voltage is detected among any two
phases. Note that this binary signal is inverted! Consequently, its pickup prevents opera-
tion of this logic because it indicates that a multi-phase fault has happened in the protected
MV system and during such condition this logic shall not be allowed to operate.

5. “Forward-EF-Detected” signal shall indicate that a forward earth fault is detected

Once the forward earth fault is detected the logic as shown in Figure 4 shall be used in order to se-
cure proper operation of all forward looking distance protection zones in case of an earth fault.
At the same time the signal “Forward-EF-Detected” shall be connected to built-in disturbance re-
corder and relevant LED indication in order to facilitate IED testing and commissioning. If required,
it can be also connected for reporting to SCADA system via the chosen communication protocol.

Figure 4: Additional directional supervision logic for each forward Distance Protection Zone

One additional AND gate, as shown in Figure 4, shall be added for each forward-looking distance
protection zone. In this document it is assumed that three forward looking zones are used within
the IED. Consequently, three AND gates as shown in Figure 4 shall be implemented in application
configuration. The associated signals with AND gate used in Figure 4 are described in the list be-
low:

1. “Forward-EF-Detected” signal shall indicate that a forward earth fault is detected.

See Figure 3 for more info regarding this signal.

2. “STNDZx-DISTANCE-PROT” signal shall come from the relevant zone of the distance pro-
tection function. This signal indicates that a non-directional start has been given from the
relevant distance protection zone.

3. “STZx-DISTANCE-PROT” signal shall come from the relevant zone of the distance protec-
tion function. This signal indicates that the relevant distance protection zone has started in
forward direction. Note that this binary signal is inverted in the logic shown in Figure 4 and
consequently it shall have logical value zero in order for this logic to operate.

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

4. Output signal from the AND gate shall be connected to a settable timer. This time shall be
set accordingly (i.e. the same time delay) as for associated forward looking distance pro-
tection zone. The only exception would be the Zone 1 which typically has no intentional
time delay (i.e. delay is set to 0.0s). It is recommended to add small time delay (e.g. 30ms)
for this timer for Zone 1 in order to avoid any possible racing issues for the involved binary
signals during fault clearing in some other feeder in the same MV power system.

5. “TRIP_Zx-Ph-Gnd_#2” signal shall indicate that ground distance protection with revised
directional criterion has operated.

Note that above described logic works in parallel with standard ground distance protection zones
which perhaps will still operate for majority of the fault cases. The standard ground distance protec-
tion zone will also operate during cross-country faults.
Signals “TRIP_Zx-Ph-Gnd_#2” shall be connected to feeder breaker trip logic, built-in disturbance
recorder and LED indications in order to facilitate IED operation, testing and commissioning. If re-
quired, this signal shall be also connected for reporting to SCADA system via the chosen communi-
cation protocol.
By implementing this logic in the Distance Protection IED [2] the proper operation of the distance
ground element during earth fault in an array cable feeder will be ensured. Therefore, it is strongly
recommended to implement such application configuration logic for wind farm installations.

4. Proposed Solution for Healthy Feeder

Solution to such problem is quite simple. The EF current magnitude supplied by the grounding
equipment (i.e. NGT and NGR combination) is typically in practice larger than this capacitive EF
current contribution from the longest healthy feeder. If that statement is true, then it is possible to
set a simple neutral current level above which the phase-to-ground measuring loops within distance
protection will only be released for operation. When this neutral current level is properly set this will
effectively disable the phase-to-ground loops for all healthy feeders during reverse EFs and only
enable distance protection phase-to-ground loops in the faulty feeder. Such solution in
REL670/REL650 can be arranged by using Phase preference logic function (i.e. PPL2PHIZ or
PPLPHIZ). Which variant shall be used depends on the selected variant of distance protection (i.e.
ZMFPDIS or ZMQPDIS). Note that the Phase preference logic function is generally intended to be
used together with distance protection for applications in high-impedance grounded networks.

To achieve this functionality the Phase preference logic function shall be properly configured in ACT
and connected to the distance protection. Then for Phase preference logic function parameters
shall be set as shown in the list below:

1. Function operation mode “OperMode=NoPref”.

2. Required level for IN release of distance protection shall be entered

(for example “IN>=43%”).

3. Required time delay for IN release (for example “tIN=0.000s”). Note that for more challeng-
ing applications (e.g. capacitive feeder EF current close to the set level) a small-time-delay
(e.g. 0.025s) can be used in order to avoid transient pickup of this element during EF in-
ception.

4. Other settings can be left to their default values.

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

By using this simple approach security of distance protection is assured. However, note that ACT
solution shown in Section 3.2 still shall be implemented for Wind Farm where MV systems is
grounded via resistance.

5. Alternative solution
It shall be noted that the array cable feeder zero sequence circuit is completely independent from
the WTG low-voltage side due to Dy connection of the power transformers which are installed in all
wind turbines, as shown in Figure 1. Therefore, the phase-to-ground distance protection measuring
loops can be just switched off and depending on MV network grounding only a certain directional
EF protection can be used as main protection against earth-faults in the feeders.

Note that the phase-to-phase loops within the distance protection function shall still be used as the
main protection against the multi-phase faults in the array cable feeder.

5.1. Resistively grounded MV systems

For such Wind Farms a simple directional EF protection (e.g. EF4PTOC function in
REL670/REL650) can be then used as main protection against all earth faults in the array feeder.
The EF4PTOC function pickup current for this directional element shall be set to 20% of the earth
fault current component determined by NGT and NGR sizing. The RCA angle for the EF4PTOC
function shall be set to 0 (or even to -5 in order to increase the margin towards the capacitive EF
current in the healthy feeders). The time delay for the feeder EF protection can be even set as in-
stantaneous. That would ensure quick and selective disconnection of all EFs in the protected array
feeder.

The only consequence of such simple solution would be that an earth fault in a delta winding of one
of WTG transformers will also cause disconnection of the whole array feeder. Probability that the
EF is within a delta winding is quite small but if such risk is not acceptable then one of the following
two solutions are possible:

1. Set EF4PTOC function with a time delay of 150ms. That will give opportunity for the in-
stantaneous EF protection installed on the HV side of the Dy power transformer inside
WTG and associated CB to clear the EF within the delta winding.

2. Set EF4PTOC function with a time delay of 50ms. That will give opportunity for the instan-
taneous EF protection installed on the HV side of the Dy power transformer inside WTG to
send a GOOSE message and block the array feeder EF protection in case that the EF is
located within the WTG transformer delta winding. Note that such GOOSE blocking mes-
sage then needs to be arranged from every WTG installed along the array feeder.

If required a transient EF protection function (i.e. APPTEF function in REL670 and REL650) can be
additionally used in order to protect array cable feeder against intermittent earth faults.

5.2. Reactor grounded MV systems

For such Wind Farms a Transient EF protection (e.g. APPTEF function in REL670/REL650) can be
then used as main protection against all earth faults in the array feeder. That would ensure rela-
tively quick and selective disconnection of the faulty feeder. More information about this function
can be found in references [2] and [3].

Consequences of such solutions are the same as the one already explained in the above section.
However, coordination with downstream EF protection might be more complicated for such system.

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

5.3. Cross Country Faults

When alternative solution by using directional earth-fault protection is applied then an additional
measure shall be taken in order to detect and instantaneously clear a Cross Country Fault (i.e. two
simultaneous EFs located in different feeders and different phases). Such fault will be actually seen
as a phase-to-phase fault for the grid transformer (GT) but phase currents will split across two feed-
ers. Even that probability of such special fault is quite low it is recommended to do the following:

Enable one non-directional stage of an earth-fault protection (e.g. EF4PTOC function in

REL670/REL650) and set its pickup above maximum EF current level with some margin. Set asso-
ciated time delay for this step to zero. Such simple protection will instantly clear cross-country fault
in both faulty feeders.

6. Solution by using REL670

Protection for MV array cable feeder in a Wind Farm can be arranged by using REL670 or even
REL650. Proposed protection block diagram for such application when REL670 is used is shown in
Figure 5. If required additional functionality like primary apparatus control can be also included.

Wind Farm MV Busbar

VT REL670 – MV Cable Array Feeder Protection 50/60 Hz

½ -19߰ x 6U - IED, 1xBIM, 1xBOM, 1xTRM

Fuse U2>/I2<
QB1
FUF SPVC

21 Z< 51_67 4(3I>) 46I2 4(I2>)

ZCV PSOF ZMF PDIS OC4 PTOC NS4 PTOC

QA1
51N_67N 4(IN>) 51N IN> 67NT Io> ߰߰TEF

EF4 PTOC PPL2 PHIZ AP PTEF

50BF 3I>BF 26 Θ>

CT
CC RBRF LC PTTR

MET UTHD 27 3U< 59 3U> 59N Uo>

QB9
VHM MHAI UV2 PTUV OV2 PTOV ROV2 PTOV

QC9
MET U MET ITHD MET I MET P/Q

V MMXU CHM MHAI C MMXU CV MMXN

DFR/SER DR 94 1߰0 21FL FL

DRP RDRE SMP PTRC LMB RFLO

Array Cable Feeder

Figure 5: REL670 block diagram for Wind Farm Array Cable Feeder Protection

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 DISTANCE PROTECTION APPLICATION FOR WIND FARMS

7. Additional Information
7.1. Listing of related documents
Ref # Document Kind, Title Document No
[1] Tsylin, A.; Kruse-Nielsen, R.; Yang, G.; Sedaghat, B.: 'Influence of
Collection Network Parameters on Performance of Distance Protection
Directional Elements in Offshore Wind Farms', IET DPSP Conference,
Liverpool-UK, March 2020
[2] Hitachi ABB Power Grids: 'REL670 Technical Manual' 1MRK 506 370-
UEN Revision M.
[3] Gajić, Z.; Zubić, S.; Kockott, M.: 'Phasor Based Transient EF Protec-
tion', WPRC 2020 Conference, Spokane-USA, October 2020

8. Revisions
Rev. Page (P) Description Date Dept./Init.
Chapt. (C)
[A] Document created 2020-08-25
TPA/ZG
[B] Small Comments Revised, section 4, 5 and 6 added 2020-11-26
TPA/ZG

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