Single-terminal Fault Location Algorithm for Electrical Lines

Precise fault location can minimize the outage time of a faulted line with benefits in power grid stability and safety. Impedance-based fault location algorithms are commonly used in fault locators, due to their simplicity. In particular, single-terminal impedance-based algorithms represent a standard feature implemented in digital relays, but they are affected by the different source of errors. In the paper, there is presented a fault location algorithm which uses only the local voltage and current phasors and the parameters of the line to estimate the distance to the fault. The algorithm was tested using simulated fault signals as well as real fault registered signals from the field. The output results were compared with the output results of two established fault location algorithms and they reveal the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed algorithm.