Protection coordination in distribution systems with and without distributed energy resources- a review

Abstract

Emission of greenhouse gases and depletion of fossil fuel reserves are two key drivers, which are forcing the mankind to generate the future energy demand from the renewable energy resources. These resources are generally distributed in nature and are directly integrated at distribution levels. Increasing penetration of the distributed energy resources in distribution power networks creates additional operational and control issues. These are mostly regulatory, economical load dispatching, power quality and protection issues. Generally power distribution systems are protected with the help of dedicated over current based protection schemes. But increasing share of distributed energy resources penetration in electric utilities poses a serious threat to the existing protection coordination schemes of the distribution systems. Distributed energy resources connected distribution networks become interconnected in nature and protection coordination schemes, which are designed for unidirectional flow of fault currents become ineffective/non-functional. Therefore, new protection coordination schemes are required for providing the adequate protection coordination for distributed energy resources connected electric power networks. In the available literature, the protection coordination schemes for radial distribution systems and developments in the area of protection coordination are discussed in detail. A thorough review for all these protection coordination schemes for distribution systems with and without distributed energy resources is done in this review article. It includes the analytical and artificial intelligence based techniques application for coordination of protective relays in the distribution systems. The limitations and research gaps in the area of protection coordination schemes are also presented in this review article. The aim of this research paper is to bring all the available research in the area of relay coordination on one platform, so that it will help the emerging researcher to identify the future scope of relay coordination application for distributed energy resources connected distribution systems.

Impact of Renewable Distributed Generation on Protection Coordination of Distribution System

“…If the TCCs have the needed separation spaces, then the devices coordinate at that location. Protective devices coordinating at one location do not necessarily coordinate at another [6].…”

“…However, graph theory is used for formulation of the relative sequence matrix for identification of primary/backup relay pairs. The mathematical technique, Artificial intelligence, Genetic algorithm, Fuzzy and Neural network based optimization methods are used for protection coordination of the radial distribution system with different level of penetration of distributed generation [6].…”

Protection Coordination of Properly Sized and Placed Distributed Generations–Methods, Applications and Future Scope

“…Determination of the new relays settings is not an easy task, therefore many different adaptive and non-adaptive algorithms and techniques are used to do so. The new designed protection coordination techniques must be efficient for information monitoring, control and communication and are known to be global protection and control schemes [85], and [86].…”

Fault protection method of single-phase break for distribution network considering the influence of neutral grounding modes

“…Phase-deficient operation will also reduce equipment service life and damage motors [1]. If the fault is not discovered in time, it is very likely to develop into a shortcircuit fault, increasing the severity of the accident and threatening personal safety [2,3]. In addition, with the access of distributed generation and electric vehicles, single-phase break fault will cause voltage to rise beyond the tolerance threshold of sensitive power electronic devices and damage it [4][5][6].…”