Testing of high voltage cable lines by damped ac

technique – a case study

Róbert Egyed Zoltán Ádám Tamus, Gergely Márk Csányi, Tamás

Iváncsy
Omexom Magyarország Kft. Budapest University of Technology and Economics
Törökbálint, Hungary Budapest, Hungary
robert.egyed@omexom.hu tamus.adam@vet.bme.hu

Abstract— In this paper, a case-study is presented, which utility company decided to investigate the condition of
emphasizes the role of local degradation detection besides the insulation of the line. For condition monitoring, damped AC
general condition assessment of the high voltage cable line technique were used. The diagnostic test was executed three
insulation. The applied damped AC method provides several times. First time, the result of the measurement showed
diagnostic parameters e.g. PD inception and extinction voltages, occurrence of partial discharge in one of the joints of cable
PD map and loss factor therefore it is an effective tool in cable line, therefore the test was repeated after 30 months. The
diagnosis. The partial discharge tests detected the weak points of second test revealed some problems with the accessories. The
the investigated cable line, which were mounted with porcelain operator decided to replace of the critical terminations and the
terminations. After the replacement of the terminations the cable
last measurement was carried out for checking the result.
line has become PD free. This case study emphasizes that from
the point of view of reliability, the weakest points of the HV cable
lines are the cable accessories. The time of the failure of these II. MEASUREMENT METHOD
components cannot be predicted exactly, the only way to prevent The applied diagnostic tests have been carried out with
the failure is the regular diagnostic testing of critical cable lines.
damped AC offline method on the cable lines. The test
Keywords— high voltage cable termination, cable accessories,
equipment evaluates the results of the PD measurement
partial discharge, damped AC, on-site cable testing, voltage according to the IEC 60270 and locates PD sources providing a
withstand test PD map. The PD map shows the PD activity along the cable
line. The equipment also calculates a loss factor value. The PD
measurement can help to determine the condition of the
I. INTRODUCTION accessories, while the tan delta measurement can be used for
The cable networks play important role in energy evaluation of the general condition of the insulation of the
distribution, however most of the cables have been in operation cable [10, 11]. In addition, withstand tests were carried out by
for 30-40 years. The safe future operation of the cable grids applying 50 damped AC voltages on each lines. The first
requires the condition monitoring of cable lines, therefore the measurement was carried out in 2012 and the second and third
reliable diagnosis of these cables is a key question [1]. The ones in 2015.
damped AC (DAC) technique as a diagnostic tool for medium
voltage cables has been used for two decades [2]. As a III. RESULTS OF THE MEASUREMENTS
development of this method, the high voltage DAC equipment
has been introduced recently [3]. This method provides several A. First diagnostic measurement
diagnostic parameters e.g. PD inception and extinction
voltages, PD map and loss factor therefore it is an effective tool The results of the tests can be seen in Table I.
for cable diagnosis [4-8]. Since the damped AC test voltage
can be increased above the nominal voltage, this test method TABLE I. THE RESULTS OF THE FIRST MEASUREMENT
can be also considered as a voltage withstand test. However,
the relation to the normal power frequency AC test is
questionable and it is still in focus of the scientific interest [9].
In this paper, a case-study of a high voltage cable diagnostic is
introduced. The investigated 3542 m long 64/110 kV cable line
has been operating from 1992 to supply the customers at
residential area. It was mounted with porcelain insulated
outdoor termination on the near end, while on the far end GIS
indoor sealing terminations were used and it consists of 4
straight joints and 2 grounded joints in each phases. During
almost entire lifetime the cable line has been operating reliably
without any outages. Considering the age (more than 20 years)
and the customer’s demand of stable and reliable supplying, the

978-1-5090-6179-2/16/$31.00 ©2016 IEEE

 Since the background noise was relatively low (47 – 63 pC)
the PD measurement was sensitive enough for reliable
evaluation. The result shows the PD inception voltage (PDIV)
of all phases are higher than the nominal voltage (PDIV=75.7 –
76.4 kVrms). The PD extinction voltages (PDEV) are lower than
the nominal voltage on L1 and L3 phases, 58.6 kVrms and
57.7 kVrms, respectively, while on L2 it is higher. Nevertheless,
the PD levels at nominal voltage are barely in excess of the
background noise. These results suggest the continuous
damage of the PDs to the cable line even at nominal voltage.
By the analysis of the results of PD mapping at 1.65·V0 (Fig. 1
and Fig. 2), the sources of PDs can be located.
Fig. 1. PD map - Intensitiy of PDs at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases
Fig. 2. PD map - PD activity at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases (N-
number of discharges)
The PD pulses are concentrated in two places. In the phase
L1 PDs are originated a joint, which is at 1776 m (screen
grounding joint) from the close end. The black dots on the
horizontal (location) axis denote the location of the joints. The
other source, in L2 and L3 phases, can be the close end of the
cable line. As the Fig. 1 and 2 show the magnitude (Fig. 1) and
the number (Fig. 2) of PDs occurred in the joint are also higher
than that of PDs detected from the terminations. If the partial
discharges detected in terminations, it is important to
investigate the phase resolved pattern of PDs to separate
internal discharges from the corona. While the internal
discharges can damage the insulation of the termination, the
corona is usually generated on the metal accessories of the
termination in air. Therefore, the latter does not provide any
information about the condition of terminations.
The phase resolved patterns are in Fig. 3–5. The Fig. 3
shows the phase distribution of PDs on L1. The pulses are
occurred mostly in the first and the third quarter of the periods
of applied voltage, between 2 and 3 ms and between 8 and
9 ms. This distribution can be observed on internal (cavity) or
surficial discharges. Since in the case of L1 the discharges are
originated from the joint at 1776 m (Fig. 1) these discharges
can damage the internal parts of this joint. In case of L2
(Fig. 4), the pulses of partial discharges also appear in the first
quarter of the sine wave of the applied voltage, therefore the
discharges in L2 are occurred inside the termination. However,
corona with low intensity can be observed in the negative peak
of the the voltage (between 12 and 13 ms), as well. Similar
distribution of PDs can be observed on termination of the L3
(Fig. 5), but discharges are also occurred in the falling edge of
the voltage (around 6 ms and 14 ms). This distribution is
typical in case of internal discharges.
Fig. 3. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L1
Fig. 4. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L2
Fig. 5. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L3
The values of tan delta have not changed with the test
voltage up to 150 kVpeak. It can be concluded that the results of
tan delta measurement show good general condition of the
cable insulation. All lines have been passed on the voltage
withstand tests. Concluding the diagnostic measurements, a
repeated diagnostic measurement within two years was
recommended to the operator in order to track the progress of
the degradation in the joint at 1776 m in L1 and the
terminations.
B. Repeated measurement after 30 months
The repeated measurements were executed after 30 months
of the first measurement. The results of the measurement are in
Table II.
TABLE II. THE RESULTS OF THE SECOND MEASUREMENT
Comparing the results with the previous measurement
results, the PD inception voltage shows significant decrease in
the phase L2, moreover this value is much lower than the
nominal voltage (PDIV=57.6 kVrms). The inception and
extinction voltages do not show remarkable changes in the case
of the other two phases (L1 and L3). The PD level at 1.7·V0
(106 kVrms) shows high increase in the phase L2: it changed
from 227 pC to 1117 pC. This characteristic of PDs also
increased on the phase L3 from 137 to 311 pC, while on the
phase L1 it decreased.
Analysing the PD map of the second measurement (Fig. 6
and 7) it can be stated the number and the intensity of PDs
originated in the terminations also increased more than one
order of magnitude.
Fig. 6. PD map - Intensitiy of PDs at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases,
second measurement
Fig. 7. PD map - PD activity at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases (N-
number of discharges)
The PDs number and magnitude did not change at the joint
at 1776 m comparing with the PD maps of previous
measurement (Fig. 1 and 2).
The phase resolved chart (Fig. 8) of L1 does not show
remarkable change comparing with the same result of the
previous measurement (Fig. 3). The phase resolved patterns of
L2 and L3 shows that the number and the magnitude of PDs
increased in the first and third quarter of the applied sinusoid
voltage (Fig. 9 and 10).
Fig. 8. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L1
Fig. 9. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L2
Fig. 10. PD phase resolved pattern of single sine wave at 150 kVpeak (1.7·V0)
on L3
These patterns prove that the sources of the increased PD
activity are in the terminations of L2 and L3.
The tan delta measurement does not sign degradation in the
general state of the cable line, however scattered PD sources
along the length of the cable can be seen in the PD map
(Fig. 6.). All lines have been passed on the voltage withstand
tests.
Based on the results of the diagnostic tests, the operator
replaced the closer terminations.
C. Results of the third measurement after 4 months.
After the replacement of critical terminations, the operator
ordered a third diagnostic measurement. The results of the
measurements are summarized in the Table III.
TABLE III. THE RESULTS OF THE SECOND MEASUREMENT
The results of the table show that after the replacement of
terminations the L2 and L3 phases are PD free, the inception
voltages were not determined by the equipment. However, it
seems the inception voltage in L1 increased the PD level at
1.7·V0 almost the same compared to the previous
measurements. The explanation could be that the partial
discharges are incepted in the termination of L1 on lower
voltages, but the main source of PDs at higher voltages is the
joint at 1776 m. Therefore, after the replacement of the
termination the inception voltage elevated, because the
elimination of the source of the partial discharges having low
inception voltage. At higher voltages the PDs incepted and they
show a similar behavior that experienced at the previous
measurements. This assumption is proved by the PD map of
the third measurement (Fig. 11 and 12).
Fig. 11. PD map - Intensitiy of PDs at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases,
second measurement
Since PD activity was not observed at nominal voltage the
repeated measurement within 5 years was suggested to the
operator.
IV. CONCLUSION
This paper introduces a case study of a diagnostic
measurement of a high voltage cable line by damped AC
technique. The first measurement of the cable detected minor
problems, low partial discharge activity and intensity, in the
accessories. This indicated a repeated measurement after 30
months. The repeated measurement showed considerable
increase of the PD activity in the terminations. Since the
inception voltage was lower than the nominal voltage of the
line, these discharges increased the operation risk. Therefore,
the operator replaced the critical terminations. The repair made
the cable line practically PD free. This was confirmed by a
diagnostic measurement after repair. This case study
emphasizes from the point of view of reliability, the weakest
points of the HV cable lines are the cable accessories such as
terminations and joints and the failure of these components can
result in serious consequences. Moreover, the occurrence of
partial discharges in these components act as a ‘time-bomb’
because the time of the failure cannot be predicted exactly, the
only way to prevent the failure is the regular diagnostic
investigation of the critical cable lines.
Fig. 12. PD map - PD activity at 1.65·V0 (106 kVrms) of each phases (N-
number of discharges)
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