VALIDATING THE EFFECT OF LIGHTNING CURRENT RISE-SLOPE IN TRANSIENT

RESPONSE OF GROUNDING SYSTEMS USING NON-UNIFORM TRANSMISSION

LINE MODEL
Nguyen Nhat Nam, Dr. Vu Phan Tu, Prof. Satoshi Matsumoto
Abstract
In this paper, Runge- Kutta method (4
th
order) is used in non-uniform transmission line model
to simulate the transient behavior of a typical grounding system. Besides, a specific simulation is
conducted for the grounding system to verify the significant effect of the rise-slope of a lightning
current to this transient phenomenon.
Introduction
Power systems are usually affected by lightning strokes with many damages. Hence, lightning
protection for these networks have to be considered carefully. In lightning protection systems,
grounding systems have a very important role that is dissipating the lightning current into the
ground safely and quickly. To simulate this phenomenon, there are three main models which are
circuit, transmission line and electromagnetic field approaches (in the order from simplicity to
complexity) [1].
In this research, a co-ordination between transmission line model and Runge-Kutta method is
conducted because it not only can be easily applied for this problem but also can provide the high
accuracy.
Non-transmission line model
In the transient analysis of tranmission line model, the distribution of voltage and current along
every electrodes in a grounding system satisfies the telegraphers equations as follows
( )
( ) ( )
( )
( )
( ) ( ) ( )
( )
, ,
, , ,
, ,
, , , .
v x t i x t
Ri x t L x t
x t
i x t v x t
G x t v x t C x t
x t
c c
= +

c c

c c

= +

c c
(1)
Fig. 1. Transmission line circuit for an electrode
The equations (1) can be presented by a equivalent circuit in Fig.1. In this, R, L(x,t), G(x,t) and
C(x,t) are per-unit length resistance, inductance, conductance and capacictance of the electrode,
respectively. These parameters are functions of space and time which can be calculated detailedly in
[1].
The grounding system and lightning current used for simulation
A typical grounding system under towers of telecomunication or wireless systems is presented
in Fig. 2. The three vertical grounding copper electrodes are 7.5mm in radius and 15m long. They
are connected by copper wires which are 5mm in radius. The electrodes resistivity used in
calculation is

. The grouding system is buried at 0.5m depth in the soil which

has relative permittivity

and resistivity

. In simulation, the lightning current is

assumed to be conducted into the injected point and the mutual effect of the uper-soil structures as
well as the skin-effect is neglected.


Fig. 2. A grounding system for simulation
The lightning currents are described as a double exponetial function

()

)
with the rise-time,

changing in a range from 1s to 8s. Besides, in oder to compare the effect of

the lightning currents rise-time, these currents all have the same peak value of 1 kA. These
ligntning currents parameters and wave-forms are shown in Tab. 1 and Fig. 3.
Table 1. Parameter of lightning currents
Num

(s) Im(kA) a(s

-1
) b(s
-1
)
1 1 1.029 23925 5452900
2 2 1.062 24779 2287300
3 3 1.101 25696 1345000
4 4 1.146 26685 908650
5 5 1.199 27750 662230
6 6 1.261 28896 506050
7 7 1.336 30150 399190
8 8 1.426 31511 322060
-5
0
5
-5
0
5
-20
-15
-10
-5
0
5

x(m)
y(m)

z
(
m
)
3 vertical
grouding
copper
electrodes
Connecting
copper wires
3m
3m
3m
air
15m
15m
15m
soil
injected
point

Fig. 3. Lightning current wave forms
Simulation results
Table 2. Peak value of over-voltages at the injected point when the rise-time changes from
1s to 8s

( s ) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
Peak value (kV) 6,722 4,543 3,662 3,177 2,929 2,823 2,692 2,539
0 0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 1.2 1.4 1.6 1.8 2
x 10
-5
0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1
1.2
t(s)
I
s
(
k
A
)


1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

Fig. 4. Over-voltage at the injected point when the rise-time changes from 1s to 8s

Fig. 5. Peak value of over-voltage at the injected point varies with the rise-time
0 2 4 6 8
x 10
-6
2
2.5
3
3.5
4
4.5
5
5.5
6
6.5
7
ts(s)
U
p
e
a
k
(
k
V
)
From the simulation results in Fig. 4, 5 and Tab. 2, the smaller the rise-time is, the higher the
over-voltage on the grounding systems is. That means the transient response on grounding systems
is affected significantly by the rise-slope of the lightning current. The reason is that the inductance
along electrodes of grounding systems can prevent the impulse current from passing by, and hence
decrease the ability of grounding systems in dissipating this current into the surrounding ground.
Conclusion
Non-uniform transmission line model is applied to simulate the transient phenomenon of
grounding systems in this research. Through the simulation results, the considerable effect of the
rise-slope of the lightning currents to this issue can be clarify. This influcence can be sumarized
briefly as the steeper this parameter is, the less effective the grounding systems are in distributing
the lightning currents into the ground. Hence, grounding systems used for lightning protection have
to be limited in their length or their building area to reduce the effect of inductances along their
component electrodes.
References
[1] Yaqing Liu, Nelson Theethayi, and Rajeev Thottappillil, Member, IEEE An engineering model
for transient analysis of grounding system under lightning strikes: Nonuniform transmission-line
approach, IEEE Trans. Power Del, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 722 730 , Apr 2005