IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 27, NO.
1, JANUARY 2012
The Use of Underbuilt Wires to Improve the
Lightning Performance of Transmission Lines
Silverio Visacro, Member, IEEE, Fernando H. Silveira, and Alberto De Conti
Abstract—An unconventional technique to improve the lightning
performance of transmission lines, consisting of the addition of
grounded wires properly positioned below the phase conductors,
is assessed. Overvoltages developed across insulator strings of ex-
isting 230-kV lines in response to direct strikes to the towers were
simulated using an electromagnetic model. Minimum reductions
of these voltages in the ranges of 19%–32% and 26%–44% were
achieved for 20- to 80- tower-footing grounding resistances due
to the addition of one and two underbuilt wires, respectively. This
practice was shown to be more efficient than reducing the tower
grounding resistance to its half value.
Index Terms—Lightning, lightning overvoltage, lightning per-
formance of transmission lines, transmission lines.
I. INTRODUCTION
IGHTNING is a frequent cause of transmission-line out-
L ages, reducing the availability of electrical networks. Ba-
sically, three mechanisms are responsible for developing light-
ning overvoltages in high-voltage lines that might result in elec-
trical discharges across insulator strings, leading to faults: the
flashover, associated with strikes to phase conductors; the back-
flashover, associated with strikes to the tower or to shield wires
at the tower vicinities; and the midspan flashover, as detailed in
[1] and [2].
For transmission lines below 500 kV installed in regions of
unfavorable soil-resistivity conditions, the backflashover largely
prevails [3]. Therefore, this mechanism, which is mainly gov-
erned by the value of tower-footing grounding impedance, is
the main focus of techniques intended to improve the lightning
performance of such lines.
The conventional practices to decrease the frequency of back-
flashover events comprise basically two actions: 1) the reduc-
tion of tower footing resistance and 2) the installation of surge
arresters to prevent flashovers. Most power utilities concentrate
their efforts in the first practice due to the costs associated with
the installation and maintenance of line surge arresters. It is
worth mentioning that reducing grounding resistance is an in-
direct way to achieve the actual goal, which is to decrease the
tower-footing grounding impedance. As explained in [4] and
[5], the low-frequency grounding resistance can be quite dif-
ferent from impulsive grounding impedance, which is the pa-
Manuscript received April 03, 2011; revised July 12, 2011; accepted August
27, 2011. Date of publication October 18, 2011; date of current version De-
cember 23, 2011. Paper no. TPWRD-00260-2011.
The authors are with the Lightning Research Center (LRC) of Federal Uni-
versity of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Horizonte 31270-901, Brazil (e-mail:
LRC@cpdee.ufmg.br).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRD.2011.2168546
0885-8977/$26.00 © 2011 IEEE
205
rameter typically used to characterize the response of electrodes
subjected to lightning currents. Nevertheless, the measurement
of this impedance is not feasible in field conditions. Since, under
certain circumstances, both parameters are related, the mea-
sured low-frequency resistance is used to verify the grounding
quality instead of the impedance, as discussed in [4].
The literature refers to some nonconventional practices
to improve the lightning performance of transmission lines.
These practices explore effects of parameters that influence
the amplitude of overvoltages developed across insulator
strings when lightning strikes the line, notably the tower surge
impedance, and the electromagnetic coupling between shield
wires and phases. It suggests the possibility of using guy
wires, continuous counterpoise, or metallic wires placed below
phase conductors, as alternative solutions to improve the line
response to direct strikes [6], [7]. Despite these suggestions,
the literature deals very poorly with the problems involved in
their implementation, and no quantitative evaluation of their
efficiency is provided.
In this perspective, this paper addresses an unconventional
technique and quantifies the improvement it might produce on
the lightning performance of lines, taking as reference an ex-
isting 230-kV line, used as a case study.
II. DEVELOPMENTS
A. Describing the Technique
The technique consists of the addition of metallic wires
installed below the phase conductors at proper distances and
connected to the tower that requires lightning performance
improvement. The underbuilt wires are extended only along the
two spans adjacent to the tower. In this paper, steel wires were
tested, though any metallic wire could be used. This technique,
explored by the authors in a sequence of works since 2002
[8]–[12], has provided encouraging results in terms of reducing
lightning overvoltages developed in response to direct strikes
to the line, and it is here refined.
Two arrangements of practical interest were identified in sim-
ulations, corresponding to the addition of one and two under-
built wires as indicated in Fig. 1. Observing a minimum distance
“ ” is required to avoid diminishing the electrical insulation of
the transmission line.
B. Methodology of Development
The proposed arrangements and the efficiency of this tech-
nique were accessed by systematic simulation using the hybrid
electromagnetic model (HEM). This frequency-domain model,
described in detail in [13], has been widely employed to deter-
mine voltage and current distributions in lightning-related prob-
206
Fig. 1. Proposed arrangement of underbuilt mettallic wires to improve the
lightning response of towers for the case-study line. (a) One additional wire.
(b) Two additional wires.
Fig. 2. Simulated condition: direct strike to the tower.
lems. In particular, its application in the calculation of lightning
overvoltages due to direct strikes to transmission lines is con-
sidered in [14]. Frequencies in the range of 1 Hz to 5 MHz with
a 12.5-kHz step were used in the simulations of this work.
The model was applied to determine the overvoltage devel-
oped across insulator strings of the real line in response to light-
ning strikes to the tower, as represented in Fig. 2. The reduc-
tion of developed overvoltages due to the addition of underbuilt
wires to the original configuration of the line was evaluated in
different conditions.
In the first evaluations, the incident lightning current was ap-
proached by a triangular 2/50- s wave with 50-kA peak current.
The peak current and front time were defined to represent a se-
vere condition associated with a first stroke current. The eval-
uations of this work do not focus on the absolute value of the
overvoltage but on the relative decrease of this quantity. Since
the triangular shape is not expected to affect the relative decrease
of the overvoltage, it was chosen to ease sensitivity analysis.
Later, the impact of this approach on the results is evaluated in
Section IV-B. The current wave was supposed to be impressed
on the tower top from a lumped current source.
Taking advantage of the linear relationship between over-
voltage across insulator strings and peak current, the results pre-
sented in this paper were adjusted to the unit “kV/kA.” This al-
lows one to promptly calculate the expected overvoltage devel-
oped for any incident current simply by multiplying the values
in the graphs by the peak current.
C. Transmission Line Used in Evaluations
In order to obtain realistic results from the application of the
technique, the evaluations were developed considering an ex-
isting 230-kV transmission line.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 27, NO. 1, JANUARY 2012
Fig. 3. Geometric configuration of the simulated line. (a) Dimension of the
mast sustained by guy wires and position of conductors. (b) Grounding electrode
arrangement.
In their original configuration, the towers of this line sus-
tain four conductors comprising a single superior shield wire
and three-phase conductors distributed in a triangular arrange-
ment, as depicted in Fig. 3 along with the grounding electrode
arrangement.
The tower mast around 40 m high has a 1.25-m lateral square-
shaped internal structure and was represented by 1- to 5-m-long
segments. The simulated heights of the single shield wire, the
upper and lower phase conductors are 37.6, 31.4, and 25.6 m as
indicated in Fig. 3(a). The structures responsible for sustaining
the upper and lower insulators strings were assumed to be 34.2
m and 28.4 m high, respectively.
The phase conductors and shield wire have 0.5- and 0.3-cm
radii, respectively, and were represented by 5-m-long segments.
The 50-m-long counterpoise of the 0.5-cm-radius grounding
electrodes buried 0.5 m deep in the ground is comprised of radial
wires departing from the base of tower mast and connected to
guy-wire anchors. The radial electrodes are bent half a meter
from the limits of the 35-m-wide right of way. The concrete
encased metallic components of each anchor were represented
by a 5-cm-radius electrode, 2.4 m long, while the central mast
foundation was represented by a 10-cm-radius electrode, 2.4 m
long. The buried conductors were represented by 0.5- to 3.5-m-
long segments.
The first simulated configuration used to include the tower
under analysis and the two adjacent towers along with all of
the aerial conductors along the 300-m-long spans and extended
30 m after the adjacent towers were followed by matching im-
pedances to avoid reflections. After observing that the pres-
ence of adjacent towers and the long wires were not able to af-
fect the simulated peak overvoltage, they were suppressed in
simulations and only the tower under analysis with 30-m-long
matched-impedance wires was represented in each span to re-
duce time consumption in simulations. The procedure to match
impedances includes the matching of self and mutual impedance
and, therefore, preserves the electromagnetic coupling between
phase conductors and underbuilt wires.
III. RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
A. Results Used as Reference: Improvements of Lightning
Performance Achieved by Grounding-Resistance Reduction
As mentioned, the grounding impedance has a fundamental
role in backflashover. Basically, this impedance is responsible
for defining the amplitude of lightning overvoltages developed
across insulator strings due to direct strikes to the tower or to
VISACRO et al.: USE OF UNDERBUILT WIRES
Fig. 4. Overvoltage across (a) upper and (b) lower insulator strings for different
grounding-resistance values (2/50-s triangular current wave).
Fig. 5. Reduction of overvoltage across the upper insulator string as a function
of grounding-resistance value.
the shield wires at tower vicinities, with this amplitude dimin-
ishing with decreasing impedance [15]. This explains why the
most common practice to improve lightning performance con-
sists in reducing the grounding impedance, with this measure
being quantified through the value obtained for the grounding
resistance [4].
In order to establish references to measure the improvement
obtained from the application of the proposed unconventional
technique, this section considers the effect of decreasing
grounding resistance on reducing overvoltages developed
across insulator strings of the existing line during direct strike
events.
Fig. 4 shows the overvoltage waves resulting across the upper
and lower insulator strings due to a strike to the tower top with
all of the assumptions indicated in Sections II-B and C, and
considering the tower grounding resistance ( ) varying from
10 to 80 . The values of were obtained assuming the same
arrangement of electrodes of Fig. 3(b) was buried in soils of
different resistivity. The peak values of such overvoltages and
the percentage of voltage reduction are indicated as a function
of in Table I and Fig. 5.
The results in Figs. 4 and 5 and Table I reveal the efficiency
of decreasing grounding resistance to improve the lightning per-
formance of transmission lines. While this resistance decreased
from 80 to 10 , the overvoltage varies from the order of 44 to
15 kV/kA. This corresponds to a lightning overvoltage reduc-
207
TABLE I
PEAK VALUES OF OVERVOLTAGES ACROSS THE UPPER AND LOWER INSULATOR
STRINGS AS A FUNCTION OF GROUNDING-RESISTANCE VALUES
Fig. 6. Effect of the addition of underbuilt wires on the overvoltages developed
across the upper (a) and lower (b) insulator strings (Rg = 20 and d = 4 m).
tion around 66 and 71%, respectively, across upper and lower
insulator strings.
Considering a 50-kA peak-current strike, the overvoltage de-
veloped for of 40 would be decreased from about 1.4 MV
to 700 kV for of 10 , achieving a value quite lower than the
230-kV-line critical flashover voltage (CFO), around 1.2 MV.
Voltages above this CFO would be developed for values of
a little above 30 .
B. Applying the Technique: First Results Concerning the
Effect of Using One and Two Underbuilt Wires
Two simple arrangements of special interest because of their
practical feasibility and efficiency were identified from the sys-
tematic application of the HEM model. They correspond to the
addition of one and two underbuilt wires as indicated in Fig. 1.
Fig. 6 shows overvoltage waves developed across insulator
strings (in kilovolt/kiloamperes) in response to the impression
of a 2/50- s triangular current wave on the tower top associated
with a direct lightning strike, considering the addition of one and
two underbuilt wires according to the arrangement of Fig. 1 and
4 m for distance “ .” A soil resistivity of 1600- m was used in
simulations, corresponding to a 20- grounding resistance for
the electrode arrangement defined in Fig. 3(b).
The addition of underbuilt wires decreases the overvoltages
very significantly and this reduction is larger for the lower in-
sulator string. The addition of one wire promotes a reduction of
208
TABLE II
DECREASE OF PEAK OVERVOLTAGE DUE TO THE APPLICATION
OF THE UNCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR Rg = 10
TABLE III
DECREASE OF PEAK OVERVOLTAGE DUE TO THE APPLICATION
OF THE UNCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR Rg = 20
TABLE IV
DECREASE OF THE PEAK OVERVOLTAGE DUE TO THE APPLICATION OF THE
NONCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR Rg = 40
around 19 and 28% for the upper and lower string, respectively,
while the reduction is much larger for the addition of two wires,
around 26 and 38%.
It is worth mentioning the very small increase of costs of an
intervention to install two underbuilt wires instead of one. Since
a return of about 40% is obtained when two wires are used in-
stead of one (overvoltage reduction of 26% against 19%), the
use of two underbuilt wires is rather preferable.
Some parameters might influence the decrease of lightning
overvoltages obtained from the technique application as ex-
plained next.
C. Influence of Tower Grounding Resistance
In order to verify the sensitivity of the overvoltage reduction
in relation to the grounding-resistance value, the same simu-
lation of the preceding section was developed considering the
tower resistance , varying from 80 to 10 . Tables II–V show
the overvoltage reduction in each case.
The results provided by the technique are improved with in-
creasing tower-footing grounding resistance. The voltage reduc-
tions across the upper insulator string for a 10- grounding-re-
sistance tower, around 16% and 24% for one and two underbuilt
wires, are increased to 32% and 44% for a 80- tower-footing.
Across the lower strings, such values evolve from 26% and 36%
to 39% and 53%, respectively.
The comparison of the results of Table I with those of Ta-
bles II–V reveals the high potential of this unconventional tech-
nique. Considering 40 , the addition of one underbuilt
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 27, NO. 1, JANUARY 2012
TABLE V
DECREASE OF PEAK OVERVOLTAGE DUE TO THE APPLICATION
OF THE UNCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR Rg = 80
wire reduces the overvoltage across the upper and lower insu-
lator strings to 77% and 69% of the original value, respectively.
This effect is more pronounced than the reduction obtained by
decreasing the grounding resistance to 30 . The addition of
two underbuilt wires promotes reductions to 69% and 58%. This
result is better than that obtained by decreasing to 20 .
This means this technique is more efficient than reducing the
grounding resistance to its half value. If one considers a 50-kA
strike to the 40- grounding-resistance tower, the peak-voltage
of 1.35 MV across upper string, exceeding the line CFO, would
be decreased to 935 kV, lower than the line CFO.
The aforementioned analysis denotes the possibility of em-
ploying such a technique as a complementary resource in a
very unfavorable soil-resistivity condition, where no efficient
grounding solution is obtained to ensure appropriate lightning
performance of transmission lines. These conditions occur
frequently; for example, when the limited length of long
lines crosses mountainous regions, presenting rocky and high
resistivity soils that make it unfeasible to achieve values of
tower-footing grounding resistance low to the extent required
to ensure appropriate lightning performance along this length.
It is worth mentioning that underbuilt wires are not expected
to cause losses due to low-frequency circulating currents, since
their use is typically recommended along short lengths of line.
D. Influence of the Distance Between Underbuilt Wires and
Phase Conductors
The distance “ ” indicated in Fig. 1 varied from 4 to 8 m.
Distances shorter than 4 m would jeopardize the line insulation
level. Table VI shows the effect of varying the distance between
underbuilt wire(s) and phase conductors, considering a 20-
grounding-resistance tower. It is shown that increasing this dis-
tance decreases the overvoltage reduction. Similar results were
obtained for towers with of 10 and 40 . Therefore, the dis-
tance “ ” should be the lowest value that still ensures the insu-
lation level of the line.
Increasing distance “ ” contributes to reducing the electro-
magnetic coupling between phase conductors and underbuilt
wires, and the drain off part of the lightning current that would
otherwise flow through one tower’s grounding resistance. Both
mechanisms are responsible for decreasing lightning overvolt-
ages, as discussed in Section III-F. This explains the decrease
of overvoltage reductions with increasing “ .”
E. Effect of Adjacent Towers
So far, the presented results correspond to simulations
that represent all wires sustained by the tower as 30-m-long
impedance-matched conductors, as described in Section II-C .
VISACRO et al.: USE OF UNDERBUILT WIRES
TABLE VI
PEAK OVERVOLTAGES AS A FUNCTION OF DISTANCE BETWEEN PHASE
CONDUCTORS AND UNDERBUILT WIRES FOR Rg = 20
Fig. 7. Overvoltage waves across upper insulator strings considering the effect
of the two adjacent towers (300-m spans between towers) for a 20- grounding-
resistance tower. (a) One underbuilt wire. (b) Two underbuilt wires (2/50-s
triangular current wave).
Therefore, these results do not take into account the effect of
the adjacent towers, and this issue is addressed in this section.
Two conditions are simulated: 1) the presence of adjacent
towers 300 m away from the central tower under analysis,
with all 660-m-long wires followed by matching imped-
ances, with the exception of the underbuilt wires (terminated
at the towers) and 2) the same as 1) but using 660-m-long
impedance-matched underbuilt wires. The tower-footing resis-
tance of adjacent towers were assumed equal to the central one.
The corresponding overvoltage waves developed across the
upper string for 20 are shown in Fig. 7 and denote that,
in the evaluated condition, the presence of the adjacent towers
does not affect the peak overvoltage either for the underbuilt
wires terminated at the adjacent towers or 30 m away.
The conclusions of the aforementioned paragraph are pre-
served even when the tower-footing resistance of the adjacent
towers is varied in the 10- to 40- range. Fig. 8 shows that this
variation has no effect on peak voltages.
The results also indicate that extending the underbuilt wires
along only the spans adjacent to the tower is enough to ensure
the overvoltage decrease. This finding makes this technique suit-
able for mitigation at hot spots (e.g., where a tower is very ex-
posed due to its excessive height).
209
Fig. 8. Effect of adjacent-tower grounding resistance on overvoltages devel-
oped across the upper string of the struck tower. Rg of adjacent towers: 10, 20,
and 40 . Rg of central tower: 20 . (a) One underbuilt wire. (b) Two under-
built wires.
F. On the Source of the Overvoltage Reduction
The reduction of the lightning overvoltage peak due to under-
built wires is achieved not only by means of the coupling effect
between phase conductors and underbuilt wires but also by the
draining off part of the lightning current that would otherwise
flow through one tower’s grounding resistance [16].
The relevance of each mechanism depends on several factors,
notably on the value of the tower-footing grounding resistance.
In this paper, a specific simulation was developed to estimate the
impact of each mechanism. A pair of 300-m-long impedance-
matched horizontal underbuilt wires was placed in a position
orthogonal to the phase conductors, considering the same tower
configuration of Fig. 2. This arrangement is very attractive since
it is able to basically promote the decoupling of underbuilt wires
and phase conductors, without significantly affecting the parcel
of the lightning current drained off by the underbuilt wires.
The results are very interesting. Table V indicates an over-
voltage reduction of 43.56% due to the addition of two un-
derbuilt wires for the 80- tower-footing grounding resistance.
Simulations show that the drain off current is responsible for ap-
proximately 72% of this overvoltage reduction, while coupling
is responsible for 28%. This conclusion is different from the as-
sumption of [6] that attributes most of the overvoltage reduction
to the increase of the coupling coefficient from shield wires to
phases.
The results also show that the coupling effect is raised for de-
creasing grounding resistance. The drain off current and the cou-
pling effect are responsible, respectively, for 59% and 41% for a
40- tower-footing grounding resistance and 44% and 56% for
a 20- grounding resistance.
IV. DISCUSSION ON THE REPRESENTATIVENESS OF RESULTS
Taking into account all of the approaches adopted so far to
ease the developed sensitivity analysis, notably concerning the
lightning current waveform, and the fact that all evaluations
were developed for only one transmission-line configuration, it
210
Fig. 9. Influence of the current front time on the reduction of the developed
overvoltage across (a) upper- and (b) lower-insulator strings due to a direct strike
to the tower (triangular current wave).
Fig. 10. Representation of the first-stroke return current. Adapted from [21].
TABLE VII
MEDIAN PARAMETERS OF THE FIRST NEGATIVE STROKE CURRENTS ADOPTED
TO REPRESENT THE CURVE ILLUSTRATED IN FIG. 10
seems prudent to check the impact on the results of considering
more realistic representation of lightning current and other line
configurations.
A. Influence of the Current Front-Time on the Overvoltage
Reduction Obtained From the Technique
In this perspective, the influence of the front time on the re-
sults was evaluated varying this parameter within a typical range
of first-stroke currents, from 2 to 6 s, still considering the tri-
angular current waveform.
The simulated results presented in Fig. 9 show that basically
the shorter the front time, the more effective the technique is,
though the effect of this parameter in the investigated range
seems quite reduced.
B. Reduction of Overvoltages Developed for a Realistic
Representation of Lightning Currents
As discussed in [17], the individual downward first-stroke
lightning current presents very particular waveform character-
istics, including an initial concavity followed by an abrupt rise
around the half-peak value and several subsidiary peaks, with
the second peak being usually higher than the first one. Fig.
10 and Table VII depict such typical waveform and the me-
dian parameters of first-stroke currents measured at Morro do
Cachimbo Station [18]. This waveform is quite similar to the
typical waveform of Berger measurements [19], [20].
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 27, NO. 1, JANUARY 2012
Fig. 11. Overvoltage developed across insulator strings due to the strike of a
realistic current wave to the tower top with one and two underbuilt wires. (a)
Upper insulator string. (b) Lower insulator string.
TABLE VIII
PEAK OVERVOLTAGES ACROSS INSULATOR STRINGS DUE TO THE STRIKE OF A
REALISTIC CURRENT WAVE TO THE TOWER TOP (Rg = 20 )
The impression of the current represented in Fig. 10 on the
tower top was simulated to evaluate how representative are the
results previously developed. The overvoltages across insulator
strings were calculated considering the application of the un-
conventional technique and a 20- grounding- resistance tower.
The results are shown in Fig. 11. In order to make the results
compatible with the previous ones, the instantaneous values of
resulting voltage were divided by the peak current, 45.3 kA, to
find the results in kilovolts/kiloamperes.
The results indicated in Table VIII show basically the same
percentage of overvoltage reductions promoted by the technique
for the 2/50- s triangular current wave and for the typical first
stroke current. Similar results were obtained for towers with
equal to 10 and 40 .
In order to speculate on the impact of the recommended prac-
tice on the lightning performance of transmission lines, rough
estimates of the outage-rate decrease due to the use of two un-
derbuilt wires were developed for lightning strikes to the towers,
considering the current waveform of Fig. 10.
The integration method [22] was used with the coefficients
provided by Hileman in [23] to determine the peak voltage re-
quired to flashover, assuming a CFO of 1.2 MV for the 230-kV
line. Based on the cumulative distribution of first-stroke peak
currents of the Morro do Cachimbo Station [18], the percent-
ages of currents expected to flash over due to lightning strikes
VISACRO et al.: USE OF UNDERBUILT WIRES
TABLE IX
PERCENTAGE OF CURRENTS EXCEEDING THE PEAK REQUIRED TO FLASH OVER
AS A FUNCTION OF TOWER-FOOTING GROUNDING RESISTANCE
Fig. 12. Other tested configurations of towers (lightning strike to the right
shield wire at the tower top).
to the towers are indicated in Table IX for different grounding
resistance values.
The authors feel it is instructive to develop a rehearsal of the
line response to the use of underbuilt wires, as described next.
An average lightning collective zone around 100-m wide
for the line with 40-m-high towers and a flash density of 4
flash km year are assumed, leading to an expectation of 40
strikes/100 km/year to the line. In this simplified approach, the
distribution of tower-footing grounding resistances is consid-
ered to have the values 40, 30, 20, and below 10 with 10%,
10%, 20%, and 60% percentages, respectively. The outage rate
of 3.27 outages/100 km/year is calculated from the values of
Table IX.
It is assumed that a two-step improvement of the line is
developed.
First, all 30- resistances are decreased to 20 , working
only on the grounding electrode arrangement and length. This
single improvement decreases the outage rate to 2.54 outage/
100 km/year (23% less than the original value).
In the following improvement, two underbuilt wires are
installed, but only at the 40- grounding resistance towers.
This further improvement decreases the ratio to the half value,
1.26 outages/100 km/year.
Even this rough estimate denotes that the use of underbuilt
wires can promote a significant reduction of the outage rate.
C. Overvoltage Reductions Obtained for Different
Transmission-Line Configurations
The validity of the previous results when the unconventional
technique is applied to other line configurations was also evalu-
ated in this work. Two other configurations represented in Fig.
12 and corresponding to existing 230-kV lines, extensively in-
stalled in Brazil, were considered. The positioning of the un-
211
Fig. 13. Details of the underbuilt-wires positioning. C, Le, and Ri mean cen-
tral, left and right insulator strings. The distance d for (a) and (b) is about 5 m,
whereas for (c) and (d), d is about 4 m. The dotted line and the “x” indicate that
the underbuilt wire reaches the tower on its right side and departs from its left
side.
TABLE X
PEAK OVERVOLTAGE REDUCTION DUE TO THE APPLICATION OF THE
UNCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR THE LINE CONFIGURATION OF FIG. 12(a).
INJECTED CURRENT TO THE TOWER TOP: 2/50-s TRIANGULAR CURRENT
WAVE. Rg = 20
TABLE XI
PEAK OVERVOLTAGE REDUCTION DUE TO THE APPLICATION OF THE
UNCONVENTIONAL TECHNIQUE FOR THE LINE CONFIGURATION OF FIG. 12(b).
INJECTED CURRENT TO THE TOWER TOP: 2/50-s TRIANGULAR CURRENT
WAVE. Rg = 20
derbuilt wires is illustrated in Fig. 13. The simulated results are
presented in Tables X–XI.
The results show reductions of overvoltage of the same mag-
nitude obtained for the line configuration of Fig. 2 since similar
distances are observed between phase conductors and underbuilt
wires. An exception to this rule is the use of only one under-
built wire in Fig. 13(c), where the reduction is a little lower.
They are also consistent with evaluations previously performed
by the authors with lines of lower voltage levels, in particular,
those shown in [10] for a 69-kV line. In fact, for such lines with
a lower voltage level, it is possible to diminish the distance be-
tween phase conductors and underbuilt wires to obtain an ad-
ditional reduction of overvoltages, with further improvement of
results.
V. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
Results of reducing overvoltage across the insulator strings of
a lightning-struck tower for existing 230-kV transmission lines
212
with the addition of underbuilt wires are presented and denote
the high potential of this technique to improve the lightning per-
formance of transmission lines.
The results were obtained by means of simulation using the
HEM model and they showed that, for a given tower, the in-
stallation of additional wires along only the two adjacent spans
yields significant lightning overvoltage reduction.
The reduction effect results from the coupling between phase
conductors and underbuilt wires and the draining off part of the
lightning current that would otherwise flow through one tower’s
grounding resistance. For tower-footing grounding resistances
around and above 40 , the draining-off effect prevails as the
main mechanism to reduce overvoltage. This is just the recom-
mended range for the use of underbuilt wires. The relevance of
the coupling mechanism increases with decreasing grounding
resistances.
For the analyzed 230-kV lines, the reductions of lightning
overvoltage across upper insulator strings are very significant,
around 19% and 26% for 20- grounding-resistance towers,
respectively, for the addition of one and two underbuilt wires.
These reductions are larger with increasing values of grounding
resistance, being around 23% and 31% for 40- grounding re-
sistance, and 32% and 44% for 80- grounding resistance. The
effect is so significant that it exceeds the one promoted by re-
ducing the value of the tower-footing grounding resistance to a
half.
A relevant parameter to determine the intensity of voltage
reduction is the distance between underbuilt wires and phases.
The shorter the distance, the larger the reduction is. That means
that for lines with lower voltage level, whose distance can
be decreased to values below 4 m without compromising the
electrical insulation, the overvoltage reduction can be further
increased.
The evaluations with representative conditions of lightning
current and different configurations of line ensure a certain gen-
erality to the results of this paper that indicate that the uncon-
ventional technique might promote minimum reductions of the
overvoltages in the ranges of 19% to 32% and 26 to 44% for 20-
to 80- tower-footing grounding resistances with the addition
of one and two underbuilt wires, respectively. This denotes the
worthiness of this technique as a complementary practice to be
used in critical spots along the line that present so unfavorable
soil-resistivity conditions that decreasing the grounding resis-
tance to ensure an appropriate response to lightning strikes is
not feasible.
It is prudent to observe the need for an in-depth evaluation of
the impact of using such techniques in existing lines, taking into
account all side effects, such as efforts due to the wind forces
acting on the additional wires. This effect, in particular, can be
compensated by including guy wires to the tower.
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mechanisms of overvoltage formation and their influence on the light-
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Silverio Visacro (M’00) received the B.Sc. and
M.Sc. degrees in electrical engineering from the
Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo
Horizonte, in 1980 and 1984, respectively, and the
Ph.D. degree from the University of Rio de Janeiro,
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992.
Since 1980, he has been with UFMG, working in
Applied Electromagnetics. Currently, he is Full Pro-
fessor of the Electrical Engineering Department and
the Head of the Lightning Research Center (LRC).
He has developed many investigation projects of a
theoretical and applied nature and is responsible for a successful relationship
between his university and industry in his fields of activity. He has authored
VISACRO et al.: USE OF UNDERBUILT WIRES 213

or coauthored many scientific papers published in reviewed journals and Alberto De Conti was born in Belo Horizonte,
presented at international conferences. He is the author of two books on Brazil, on August 3, 1975. He received the Techni-
lightning and grounding, respectively. He is an Associate Editor of the Journal cian degree in industrial electronics from the Federal
of Lightning Research. He is a regular reviewer of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON Center of Technologic Education (CEFET-MG),
ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY and the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER Belo Horizonte, Brazil, in 1994 and the B.Sc., M.Sc.,
DELIVERY. His current research interests include electromagnetic modeling, and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from the
lightning physics, as well as protection and grounding. Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo
Prof. Visacro is an effective member of the American Geophysical Union Horizonte, in 2000, 2001, and 2006, respectively.
(AGU) and International Council on Large Electric Systems (CIGRE), where he In 2006, he was a Guest Researcher in the Divi-
convened the Working Group “Response of Grounding Electrodes to Lightning sion for Electricity and Lightning Research, Uppsala
Currents.” University, Uppsala, Sweden. Currently, he is a Full-
Time Lecturer with the Department of Electrical Engineering, UFMG, where
he is also an Associate Researcher with the Lightning Research Center (LRC).
His research interests include lightning, lightning interaction with electrical sys-
Fernando H. Silveira was born in São Paulo, Brazil, tems, electromagnetic transients, electromagnetic modeling, and electromag-
on May 18, 1977. He received the B.S., M.S., and Dr. netic compatibility.
Eng. degrees in electrical engineering from the Fed-
eral University of Minas Gerais (UFMG), Belo Hor-
izonte, Brazil, in 2000, 2001, and 2006, respectively.
Currently, he is a Full-Time Lecturer with the
Department of Electrical Engineering, UFMG,
where he is also an Associate Researcher with
the Lightning Research Center (LRC). His current
research interests include electromagnetic modeling,
electromagnetic transients, lightning, lightning-in-
duced voltages, lightning interaction with electrical systems, and lightning
performance of transmission lines.
Dr. Silveira is a regular reviewer of the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON
ELECTROMAGNETIC COMPATIBILITY and the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER
DELIVERY.