Exploitation experience in partial discharge diagnostics of power transformers

This paper presents exploitation experience in partial discharge (PD) diagnostics of power transformers, with particular consideration of practical aspects and potential limitation of the contemporary measuring techniques. The objective of this study is to indicate typical problems related to PD diagnostics of power transformers and to propose practical solutions based on simultaneous application of several PD measuring methods. Three case studies based on real life scenarios are used to illustrate practical aspects and potential limitation of the contemporary PD diagnostics. Each scenario addresses a different PD issue, and different measurement results achieved using electrical, UHF and acoustic emission (AE) methods. Presented results extend the state-of-art through the detailed analysis of presented exploitation case studies. Thus, it may be potentially used for optimization of the maintenance process and improvements of PD diagnostics regarding power transformers.