 Inexpensive device which allows passage of very

small leakage current through it under normal

conditions, but diverts away high voltages
inimical to insulation of equipment it is supposed
to protect by giving them a path through itself,
thereby prevents outage of costly equipment
due to insulation failure
 Reasons of High voltages – Switching, lightening
 Indispensable device in Insulation-coordination
 BIL for 400kV Sys. Around 1425kV.As per IEC
highest allowed is 1239kV
 The smartness of SA lies in limiting the voltage rise
well below 1239kV when a lightning impulse
current of 10kA is impressed.
 Development of Surge Arresters has taken
place during the period 1940 to 1980’s in
the following stages
 1940’s – Surge Arresters with rod gap
 1950’s – Surge Arresters with SiC discs
 1960’s – Surge Arresters with SiC discs & active
gap.
 1970’s – Surge Arresters with magnetically blown
gaps for EHV-AC systems.
 1975’s – Surge Arresters without gap & with metal
oxide discs for EHV-AC.
 1979’s – Gapless Metal Oxide Arresters for HVDC
 1980’s – Gapless SiC Arresters with SF6 insulation
 1980’s – Gapless ZnO Arresters (MO)for various
application
 Extremely nonlinear characteristic of MO type SAs
thereby doing away with need of disconnection from
mains through serial spark-gaps as in case of SiC type
 Continuous flow of leakage current through gapless
MO type SAs render them suitable for condition
monitoring, which was earlier not possible in case of
gapped SiC type SAs. This continuous flow of leakage
current gives picture of inside of MOSA
 Condition monitoring of SA required to pre-access
performance of SA during system over voltages when
it is supposed to intervene in addition to prevent
consequential damages it may cause due to its own
bursting
 Being one of the oldest among power utilities was
having vast population of conventional valve type
SAs with SiC discs
 Self realization of disadvantages of SiC type
arresters
 First intro to MOSA during 1997 through a
presentation cum demo by CGL
 Feedbacks from other utilities
 Decision to replace convention type with MOSA in
phased manner taken in 2000-01.
 First priority Generating Stations
 Rest in phased manner
 Degradation of insulation properties and
protective function of SA on account of:-
 Ingress of moisture due to sealing degradation
 Pollution and surface contamination
 Overloading due to improper design or transient over
voltages
 Internal partial discharges
 An arrester failure may result in:-
 Porcelain housing bursting and can cause serious
damage to surrounding apparatus
 Earth fault due to internal flashover
 Bursting when it is supposed to intervene leaving
equipment to the mercy of High voltage spike
 Visual inspection: Reveals only external factors such as seal
deterioration, arrester housing cracks and pollution etc. No
information about internals
 Counters with mA-meters: Total leakage current indicates
nothing about internal health. Reads between 2-10mA of
capacitive current mainly. No change observed in values
even in case of failing arresters
 Surge counters: counts impulses at currents above
certain amplitude and duration. Short discharge
intervals usually missed.Surge counting alone is not
suffice for indication health of SA
 Temperature measurement: Based on principle of
thermal imaging which assumes that since an arrester
generally fails due to thermal runaway, therefore it will
be hot in comparison to other healthy arresters
 Partial discharge detection: Based on principal that
an arrester experience partial discharge during rain,
snow and fog and negligible partial discharge in dry
weather conditions. Pre-condition that arrester must be
tested for PD after manufacture so as to have baseline
value. Suffers drawback of noise.
AS PER IEC-60099(5), TECHNIQUES FOR THE HEALTH
MONITORING OF SURGE ARRESTERS IN SERVICE
ARE

1. TOTAL LEAKAGE CURRENT MEASUREMENT

2. WATT LOSS MEASUREMENT
3. INSULATION RESISTANCE MEASUREMENT
4. THIRD HARMONIC RESISTIVE CURRENT
MONITORING.
5. THIRD HARMONIC RESISTIVE CURRENT (THRC)
MONITORING WITH COMPENSATION FOR THIRD
HARMONICS IN SYSTEM VOLTAGE.
- HARMONICS ARE CREATED IN LEAKAGE CURRENT ON
- APPLICATION OF FUNDAMENTAL FREQUENCY, DUE TO
NON LINEAR VOLTAGE-CURRENT CHARACTERSTIC OF
SURGE ARRESTERS.
- THIRD HARMONIC IS THE LARGEST HARMONIC
COMPONENT OF THE RESISTIVE CURRENT
 Realization developed that technique is
insufficient and periodic recording of “Third
harmonic resistive leakage current” is must for
checking condition of MOSAs
 TransiNor make LCM-II procured in year 2003.
 Centralized team formed to measure the above
parameter so as to collect sufficient data for
developing some internal standards
 Based on Internal data and inputs from other
utilities, guidelines adopted in sep, 2004.
 The periodicity of monitoring may be fixed 2 years and
shall be reduced to 6 months for MOSAs having
value of resistive leakage current more than 200µ A
and having rising trend
 MOSAs with resistive leakage current more/around 200µ
A but installed on transformers may be interchanged
with MOSAs having value of resistive leakage current
less than 100µ A and installed on transmission lines
 MOSAs with resistive leakage current more than 1000µ
A may be taken as critical and should be either
monitored quarterly for rise or may be considered for
replacement
 The adoption of MOSAs having better Volt-
amp. characteristics as compared to valve
type SAs helped in saving costly equipments
 Periodical condition monitoring of MOSAs also
helped in preventing unpredictable outages
and consequential damages resulting from a
Surge arrester bursting
 LCM for condition monitoring of MOSA quite
popular but the technique still suffers from
certain drawbacks
 Influence of weather conditions and poor
repeatability of readings either due to lack in
training of LCM operating personals or
uncontrolled electrical interference prevalent
in HV substations
 During specification preparation for procurement
of new LCM, problem of selecting range of
resistive leakage current
 One manufacturer says upto 900µA sufficient
where as other stresses nothing less than 9mA will
be suffice
 Convoluted explanations of manufacturers
obligated us to refer the issue to CPRI
 Based on inputs from CPRI and references from
IEC 60099-5, specification freezed