Unit-5

FUNDAMENTALS OF ARC
INTERRUPTIONS
 Syllabus
• Ionization of gases, deionization, ARC Formation
• DC and AC circuit breaking
• Current interruption in AC circuit breakers
• Transient recovery voltage (TRV) –derivation of rate
of rise of TRV
• Resistance switching
• Current chopping
• Interruption of capacitive current.

CO5: Demonstrate the arc interruption and analyze the RRRV

in circuit breakers
 Formation of ARC

• Under faulty condition heavy current flows through

the contacts of the circuit breaker before they are
opened.

• The contacts start separating, the area of contact

decreases which increase the current density and
consequently rise in temperature.
 Physics of arcing phenomenon and arc interruption
• During opening of current carrying contacts in a circuit
breaker the medium in between opening contacts become
highly ionized through which the interrupting current gets
low resistive path and continues to flow through this path even
the contacts are physically separated.

• During the flowing of electric current from one contact to

other the path becomes so heated that it glows. This is
called as arc in a circuit breaker.

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• The production of arc may delay the current
interruption process and generate emormous heat
which may cause serious damage to system or to circuit
breaker itself.

• Therefore, the main problem in a circuit breaker is to

extinguish the arc within the shortest possible time.
The arc resistance depends upon the following factors:
• Degree of ionization— the arc resistance increases
with the decrease in the number of ionized particles
between the contacts.

• Length of the arc— the arc resistance increases with

the length of the arc i.e., separation of contacts.

• Cross-section of arc— the arc resistance increases

with the decrease in area of X-section of the arc.

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 Arc interruption
• There are two methods of extinguishing the arc in circuit breakers
namely,

High resistance method

In high resistance method the arc resistance is increased with time. This
will reduce the current to such a value which will be insufficient to
maintain the arc. Thus the current is interrupted and the arc is
extinguished. This method is employed in only d.c circuit breakers. The
resistance of the arc may be increased by
– Lengthening of arc
– Splitting of arc
– Cooling of arc

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 Arc interruption

• Low resistance (or) current zero method- employed in

modern A.C.breakers.

• In this method, the arc resistance is kept low until the current
is zero where the arc extinguishes naturally, and it’s prevented
from restriking after it has gone out at a particular

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 DC Circuit Breaking

• When the fault occurs in the system, the mechanical contacts

of the circuit breaker are pulled apart and thus their circuit is
open.

• In HVDC circuit breaker, circuit breaking is difficult because

the current flow through it is unidirectional and there is no
zero current.
• With DC circuit breakers, the problem is more complex as the DC
waveform does not have natural current zeros.

• Forced arc interruption would produce high transient recovery voltage

and restrike without arc interruption and ultimate destruction of the
breaker contacts.
 DC Circuit Breaking
For this, we will consider a circuit which will consist of generator with voltage E,
resistance R, inductor L and the circuit breaker as shown in the Fig.

It could be seen that curve AB represents the voltage E - iR, i is the current at any
instant.

The curve XY represents the voltage-current characteristics of the arc for decreasing
currents.
• When the circuit breaker starts opening it carries the load current I = E/R.
• In the graph shown the current is shown to be reduced to i1, i2 and i3
respectively.
• Section pr represents voltage drop i3R whereas qs represents arc voltage
which is greater than available voltage.
• The arc becomes unstable and the difference in voltage is supplied by
inductance L across which the voltage is eL =L di/dt .
• The voltage across inductance L is seen to be positive in the region of
currents i1 and i2 since the arc characteristics lies below the curve AB.

• The arc current in this region tries to increase so interruption of current is

not possible in this region.

• Afterwards the arc is lengthened with increase in contact separation which

will raise the arc voltage above the curve AB,
 The operation in case of d.c. circuit breakers is
slid to be ideal if the characteristics of the arc
voltage are above the curve AB even in the
region of currents i1 and i2. This is shown in
the Fig.

It can be seen that arc voltage is greater than

E - iR and the balance between the voltages
is supplied by the voltage across the
inductance eL which is proportional to rate of
change of current di/dt.

Thus the function of the circuit breaker is to raise the arc characteristics without
affecting its stability. This is done by reducing the arcing time which is the time
from contact separation to final extinction of arc. But it will increase extinction
voltage
In designing of HVDC circuit breakers, there are three main problems to
be overcome. These problems are

• Creation of artificial current zero.

• Prevention of restrikes arc.

• Dissipation of stored energy.

 AC Circuit Breaking

• In A.C.Circuits the current passes through zero twice in one

complete cycle. When the currents are reduced to zero the
breakers are operated to cut –off the current. –It is difficult

• The restriking of arc when current is interrupted is

dependent on the voltage between the contact gap at that
instant which will in turn depend on power factor.

• Higher Pf voltage lesser appearing across the gap

 Current Interruption in A.C. Circuit Breakers

Sudden 3-Phase Short circuit of an alternator

Generally the a.c. circuit breakers employ zero point interruption technique. Let us
consider an alternator on no load to which a circuit breaker is connected which is
shown in the Fig. . The circuit breaker is in open position with its other side short
circuited.
When the voltage of phase B w.r.t neutral is zero, the circuit breaker is closed.
OA which is maximum instantaneous value of current during
short circuit - Making current in kA

Current and voltage waveforms during Fault Clearing

Arc Voltage:
It may be defined as the voltage that appears across the contact
during the arcing period, when the current flow is maintained in the
form of an arc.

Active Recovery Voltage:

It may be defined as the instantaneous recovery voltage at the instant
of arc extinction.

Restriking Voltage:
It may be defined as the voltage that appears across the breaking
contact at the instant of arc extinction.
Recovery Voltage:
It may be defined as the voltage that appears across the breaker contact
after the complete removal of transient oscillations and
final extinction of arc has resulted in all the poles.

Rate of Rise of Restriking Voltage (RRRV):

It is defined as the ratio of peak value of restriking voltage to
time taken to reach to peak value.