40th Southeastern Symposium on System Theory
4
University of New Orleans
New Orleans, LA, USA, March 16-18, 2008
Algorithms For Fault Location And Line
Parameter Estimation Utilizing Voltage and
Current Data During the Fault
Yuan Liao', Senior Member, IEEE
Abstract- This paper puts forward a new fault location and
line parameter estimation algorithm by utilizing only the
voltage and current measurements during the fault. The
algorithm is applicable to unbalanced faults. Positive-sequence
line parameters can be calculated for line to ground, line to line
to ground and line to line faults. Zero-sequence line parameters
can also be obtained for line to ground faults. Distributed
parameter line model is employed to achieve high accuracy.
Index Terms- Fault location, Transmission line parameter
estimation.
I. INTRODUCTION
Speedy and precise fault location plays an important role
in accelerating system restoration, reducing outage time and
significantly improving system reliability [1]-[3].
While there have been various fault location approaches
proposed in published literature, most of them require line
parameters including series resistance and inductance and
shunt capacitance of the line. One method that obviates the
need of line parameters is described in [1], which utilizes
unsynchronized voltage and current from both ends of the
line during the fault. This algorithm performs well for short
lines and may introduce noticeable errors for long lines due
to neglecting shunt capacitance of the line.
Reference [3] extends the method in [1] to model the shunt
capacitance by taking advantage of the pre-fault voltage and
current measurements based on distributed parameter line
model. Our studies have indicated that the method in [3] can
achieve highly accurate results.
This paper further develops a method by obviating the
need of pre-fault measurements, and by taking advantage of
only the voltages and currents during the fault.
In comparison with existing algorithms demanding line
parameters, the developed algorithms in [1], [3] and this
paper have advantages of immunity to line parameter errors.
The derived line parameters can also be useful inputs to all
sorts of power system analysis programs.
Yuan Liao (yliao@engr.uky.edu) is with the Department of electrical and Vfiql, 'fql positive sequence voltage and current during the
computer engineering, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA.fl
978-1-4244-1807-7/08/$25.OO ©2008 IEEE.
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MC1.
The proposed methods are based on fundamental
frequency phasors. Synchronized or unsynchronized data
may be employed. The line is assumed to be transposed.
In the rest of the paper, Section II presents the fault
location and line parameter estimation algorithm by
modelling shunt capacitance based on distributed parameter
line model. Section III reports the evaluation study results
for verifying the performance of the proposed algorithms,
followed by the conclusion.
II. FAULT LOCATION AND LINE PARAMETER ESTIMATION
BASED ON DISTRIBUTED PARAMETER LINE MODEL
In this paper, we consider a transposed line between two
terminals P and Q. The following discussion assumes that
unsynchronized voltage and current measurements at P and
Q during a fault are available [2], [3].
1 P R Q
I L
-;
_L- F
T_- I
r
2 2 T r
T
Figure 1. Positive sequence network during the fault
Figure 1 depicts the positive sequence equivalent 2T
circuit of the line during the fault [2], [3]. R indicates the
fault point. The following notations are employed.
Zpr , Zqr equivalent positive-sequence series impedance of
the line segment PR and QR;
y
pr' Yqr equivalent positive-sequence shunt admittance of
the line segment PR and QR;
VfP1, Ifpl positive sequence voltage and current during the
fault at P;
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 MC1.4

Vfrl Ifrl positive sequence voltage and current during the Vfp2' I'fp2 negative
I sequence voltage and current during
fault at R; the fault at P;
3 synchronization angle between measurements at P Vfq2, fq2 negative sequence voltage and current during
and Q. the fault at Q.
The equivalent line parameters are computed based on the And X is defined as the unknown variable vector
distributed parameter line model as follows [4]-[5].
r, a, b]T
Z,pr =ZCsinho4,) (I) X = [11, ,
Where, T symbolizes the vector and matrix transpose
(9)
Zqr =ZCsinh[y(l - li)] (2) operator.
Ypr z tanh(i) (3) Referring to Figure 1, we further obtain
2
2 y(l-l, Yqrpr ___ Ypr Y p
___~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~o
Yqr z tanh[ 2 (4) fr12fpl-'pi22 2 2
Zc-
Y
zi (5) + J fql -
VqI -[Vql-Zqr (fql -Vfql q r)] qr le
( 0())
y= Iz,y, (6)
and similarly using negative sequence components, we can
write
Wvlhere,
11 fault distance from P to R; ifr2=Jfp2-VfP2 r

2fp
_[Vf -
pf Zpr(IfJ2 - Vp2 Pr )] pr
2 2
1 length of the line in mile or km; y y y
Zc line;
positive sequence characteristic impedance of the + {'fq2 - Vfq2 ~qr ~ -zqr
[Vfq2 ~~ (fq2 ~ qr)] qrje5
- Vfq2 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
line;
y positive sequence.. .. .constant of the line;
propagation
~~~~~~The following sections present the algorithms for
z1, Yi positive sequence series impedance and shunt unsymmetrical faults.
admittance of the line per mile or km, respectively.
z, = r, + ja1, r1 and a1 being positive sequence series A. Forsinglelinetoground(LC)fault
resistance and reactance per mile or km, respectively. Let us take a phase A to ground fault as an instance. We
Yi = jbl , b, being the positive sequence shunt susceptance have
per mile or km.
Utilizing positive sequence voltage and current, we obtain
f X
(12)
[5] It can be seen that (7), (8) and (12) hold true based on the
f(X)= voltage and current measurements during the fault. Define
y
F(X) as a function vector composed of the following six
Vfpl-Zpr (If V-VfPr)2 functions:
qr (7)
[Vfql Zqr(lfql Vfql
- - )]e' 0 F2j_j(X) =Re(fi(X)), i= 1 ... 3 (13)
2 F2 (X) Im(f1(X)), i1 ...3 (14)
Similarly, employing negative sequence voltage and Where Re(.) and Im(.) yield the real and imaginary part of
current results in the argument, respectively.

f2 (X) = Then the five unknown variables can be obtained following

Vfp2V- Zpr(Ifp2 -vVfp Ypr)
2 (8) the well-established least squares approach [5]:
X 41 =Xv+&X (15)

-iVfiq2 -Zqr(Jfq2 -Vfq2 -)]eX'8 = OA/X=-(HTH) [HTF(Xv)] (16)

Where, H= 8F(X) (17)
Where,

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 MC1.4

Xv, Xv+1 variable vector at and after vth iteration;

v iteration number starting from 1; f6 (X) =fri + Ifr2 0 (20)
AX variable update vector;
H Jacobian matrix. Thus, (7), (8) and (20) are valid for phase B to C faults.
Similarly, the unknowns can be calculated based on the
The iterative process can be terminated when the variable iterative method.
update is less than the specified tolerance. C. For line to line to ground (LLG) faults
Once the positive-sequence line parameters, fault location L
and synchronization angle are obtained, for LG faults, it may Let us take phase B to C to ground fault as an example. As
also be possible to estimate the zero-sequence line illustrated tn [4], the positive- and negative-sequence
parameters as shown below. voltages at the fault point are equal. Hence,
For phase A to ground fault, we derive
(XO) - f4 (X0) f7 (X) =Vfpl-Zpr (lfplVfpl~~~
P)
~~2 (21)

Vjp0 ~Zpro(Jpo VjpO (18)-4Vjp2 -Zpr(lfp2 -Vfp2 YP)r = 0

y
~~~(18)
-[VfqO - ZqrO (lfqO - VfqO °qr2 )]e '8 =0 So, we have (7), (8) and (21) for phase B to C to ground
faults. Similarly, the unknowns can be calculated based on
Where, the iterative method.
X0 a vector consisting of zero sequence series resistance ro As will be illustrated in Section lll, for LLG faults, the
, reactance ao and shunt susceptance bo per mile or km, proposed method will fail to provide reliable line parameter
respectively; XT [r0, ao,bo]T estimation if the fault location is 0.5 p.u. This is because for
a fault location of 0.5 p.u., the matrix (HTH) will become
Vfpo~ ~ fp0 zero sequence voltage and current during the ill-conditioned due to structural characteristics of (7), (8) and
fault at P; (21), when the fault location and synchronization angle
Vfqo, ifqo zero sequence voltage and current during the approach the correct values during the iteration process.
fault at Q; Nonetheless, the fault location and synchronization angle
ZprO' Zqro equivalent zero-sequence series impedance of estimates are still highly precise.
Note that estimation of zero-sequence line parameters
the line segmentqPRvand QR; utilizing only fault data is not possible for LL and LLG
Ypr0, Yqr0 equivalent zero-sequence shunt admittance of faults.
the line segment PR and QR. In absence of line parameters, it is not possible to derive a
ZprO ' ZqrO ' YprO r and Yqro are functions of ro, ao and fault location method for three phase faults (LLL) based only
on the fault data, which can take line shunt capacitances into
bo . These equivalent parameters have similar expressions to account.
(1) - (4) and are not shown here. Apparently, if synchronized measurements are employed,
3 can be set to be equal to zero in the equation and there
In addition, we can acquire another equation will one less variable to estimate. Alternatively, the state
estimation theory may be made use of to detect
f5(XO) = Ifr Ifro = 0
- (19) synchronization accuracy as elucidated in [5]. Moreover,
employing fault records during multiple different events may
Where I is* the zero-sequence curent during the fault at R lead to more precise results based on state estimation
and has a similar expression to Ifrl except that zero
sequence quantities are utilized. III. EVALUATION STUDIES

Therefore, (18) and (19) are valid for phase A to ground This section presents evaluation studies based on
faults. We have three unknown variables ro, ao and bo. ElectroMagnetic Transients Program (EMTP) simulation
Similarly, the unknowns can be calculated based on the data.
iterative method. The 500 kV and 200 mile transmission line system as
utilized in [1] is adopted here. The line is modeled based on
distributed parameter line model. The per unit system is
B. For line to line (LL) faults employed with a voltage base of 500 KV and a voltampere
Let us take phase Bto Cfault as anexample, base of 1000 MVA. The actual values of the positive-

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 MC1.4

sequence line parameters in per unit are 0.00099667 for r, Table I. Fault location estimates obtained by the proposed method
0.0023566 for a, and 0.0018349 for b, respectively. The Fault Fault Actual FL Estimation
actual values of the zero-sequence line parameters in per unit Type Res. FL (p.u.) Error (%)
are 0.0024096 for rO, 0.0072839 for aO, and 0.0011373 for (ohm)
bo, respectively. Diverse types of faults with different fault 0.3 0.039
locations and fault resistances have been simulated to LG 60 0.5
0.7 0.00
0.069
generate voltage and current waveforms. Then Fourier 0.3 0.00
transform is applied to extract the voltage and current LL 5 0.5 0.00
phasors to evaluate the performance of the proposed fault 0.7 0.034
location algorithms. To simulate synchronization error, we 0.3 0.00
have rotated the phasors at terminal Q by 10 degrees in all LLG 60 0.5 0.00
0.7 0.00
cases.
The proposed algorithms have been implemented in
Matlab. The following technique has been adopted to speed Table II. Positive sequence line parameter estimates obtained by the
up convergence. During each iteration, the fault location is proposed method
kept between zero and one by setting it to zero when it
becomes negative and setting it to one when it exceeds one. Fault Fault Actual Error of Error of Error of
The line parameters are constrained as positive values by Type Res. FL estimated estimated estimated
sett1ngthem
setting t 1emtotoinitial
1nltlava ues w
values 1en t1ey
when negat1ve.
Decome negative.
they become (ohm)~~~(Oo)
(p.u.) resistance reactance
(Oo) susceptance
(Oo)
Evaluation studies show that this accelerating method works LG 0.3 0.28 0.094 0.023
well and will not cause uncontrollable oscillations in the LG 60 0.5 0.31 0.36 0.075
convergence process. LL 5 0.5 0.091 0.058 0.015
In this study, the fault location accuracy is measured by LL 5 0.7 0.17 0.33 0.071
LLG 60 0.3 0.17 0.011 0.36
the percentage error calculated as LLG 60 0.5 1.78 0.65 56.3

Actual location - Estimated location Il 00 (22)

Total line length Table II presents the positive sequence line parameter
estimates for LG, LL and LLG faults. It is demonstrated that
The line parameter estimation accuracy is measured by the highly precise results have been obtained except for the last
percentage error evaluated as case where a LLG fault with a fault location of 0.5 p.u.
occurs.
Actual parameter value - Estimated parameter value 100 For the last case in Table II, the errors for estimated fault
Actual parameter value location and synchronization angle are 0.00°0 and 0.00
(23) degrees respectively. This manifests that for LLG faults with
a fault location of 0.5 p.u., although the line parameters
cannot be reliably determined, the proposed method still
To estimate X, the iteration process is terminated when yields highly accurate estimates for fault location and
the update of the fault location becomes less than 1E-6. To synchronization angle.
estimate XO, the iteration process is terminated when the After the positive sequence line parameters are figured out,
the zero sequence line parameters for LG faults can be
updates of all variables become less than IE-7. The initial
values for X adopted are: 0.5 p.u. for fault location, zero for calculated. For example, for a LG fault with fault resistance
3, 1E-3 for r and rO,2E-3 for a and a0, and 1E-3 for b. of 1 ohm and fault location of 0.3 p.u., the estimation errors
for the resistance, reactance and susceptance of the zero
and bo, respectively. The algorithm reaches convergence sequence circuit are 0.088%, 0.68% and 0.45%, respectively.
within nine iterations for all cases.
The fault location estimates obtained by the proposed
approach are presented in Table I. The fault type, fault IV. CONCLUSION
resistance and actual fault location are given in the Ist, 2nd
and 3rd column, respectively. The estimation error is
displayed in the 4th column. Note that the proposed approach l than troansm ssio le palrametestilizing onuly
is not applicable to LLL faults. It is evinced that quite t a
accurtersult hav bee acheved synchronized and unsynchronized data can be made use of.
Pre-fault data are not needed. Depending on fault types,
positive-sequence, zero-sequence parameters, or both may
be derived. Evaluation studies based on EMTP simulation
have demonstrated quite promising results. The advantages

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 MC1.4

brought about by the proposed methods include: a) the fault

location estimation is immune to line parameter errors, and
b) the accurate estimate of line parameters can greatly
benefit various power system applications.

V. REFERENCES

[1] Yuan Liao and S Elangovan, "Unsynchronized two-terminal

transmission line fault location without using line parameters", IEE
Proceedings - Part C: Generation, Transmission and Distribution,
vol. 153, no. 6, pp. 639-643, November 2006.
[2] Yuan Liao, "Fault location utilizing unsynchronized voltage
measurements during fault", Electric Power Components & Systems,
vol. 34, no. 12, pp. 1283 - 1293, December 2006.
[3] Yuan Liao, "Algorithms for power system fault location and line
parameter estimation", the 39th Southeastern Symposium on System
Theory, Mercer University, Macon, Georgia, March 4-6, 2007.
[4] John Grainger and William Stevenson, Power System Analysis,
McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, USA, 1994.
[5] Yuan Liao and Mladen Kezunovic, "Optimal estimate of transmission
line fault location considering measurement errors", IEEE
Transactions on Power Delivery, vol. 22, no. 3, pp. 1335-1341, July
2007.

VI. BIOGRAPHY
Yuan Liao (S'98-M'00-SM'05) is an Assistant Professor with the
Department of electrical and computer engineering at the University of
Kentucky, Lexington, KY, USA. He was a R&D Consulting Engineer and
then Principal R&D Consulting Engineer with the ABB Corporate Research
Center, Raleigh, NC, USA. His research interests include protection, power
quality analysis, large-scale resource scheduling optimization and
EMS/SCADA design.

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