Adaptive de-noising method based on wavelet and adaptive learning algorithm in on-line PD monitoring

It is an important step in the online monitoring of partial discharge (PD) to extract PD pulses from various background noises. An adaptive de-noising method is introduced for adaptive noise reduction during detection of PD pulses. This method is based on Wavelet Transform (WT), and in the wavelet domain the noises decomposed at the levels are reduced by independent thresholds. Instead of the standard hard thresholding function, a new type of hard thresholding function with continuous derivative is employed by this method. For the selection of thresholds, an unsupervised learning algorithm based on gradient in a mean square error (MSE) is present to search for the optimal threshold for noise reduction, and the optimal threshold is selected when the minimum MSE is obtained. With the simulating signals and on-site experimental data processed by this method, it is shown that the background noises such as narrowband noises can be reduced efficiently. Furthermore, it is proved that in comparison with the conventional wavelet de-noising method the adaptive de-noising method has a better performance in keeping the pulses and is more adaptive when suppressing the background noises of PD signals.