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A Field-to-Line Coupling Model for Overvoltage Analysis in Light-Rail Transit DC Traction Power Systems
Federico Delno, Member, IEEE, Renato Procopio, Student Member, IEEE, and Mansueto Rossi
AbstractThis paper faces the problem of the protection against overvoltages of atmospheric origin for modern electric mass-transit systems such as light-rail transportation systems (LRTS) and proposes a transmission-line (TL) model for the eld-to-line coupling, which allows to evaluate the response of the supply system of a typical LRTS to a generic electromagnetic eld. The incident-eld excitation has been modeled in the time domain by means of a plane wave and the method of characteristics has been applied in order to solve the resulting partial differential equation (PDE) system. The developed model has been implemented into the electromagnetic code PSCAD-EMTDC and several simulations have been performed in order to determine the optimal conguration in terms of locations of the surge arresters for the overvoltage protection system. Index TermsElectromagnetic coupling, electromagnetic transient propagation, overvoltage protection.

I. INTRODUCTION

IGHT RAIL is a modern form of public transit in which electric trains carry passengers on steel rails between stations along certain routes in urban areas [1]. The trains, generally fed by a dc voltage supply, run in dedicated lanes, either in the medians of city streets or in exclusive rights of way. They stop at stations located every half-mile to one mile and trigger trafc lights to turn green on their approach so that the trains only stop at stations. Light rail acts as an efcient, quiet, and comfortable alternative to get across town quickly while avoiding congestion. In addition, it offers convenient and effective mobility that perfectly integrates into the urban landscape. From the point of view of the system and vehicle engineering, the research activity carried out until now in the electrical eld has mainly focused on the following three areas: study of electromagnetic-interference (EMI) problems affecting the operations of the signaling systems and the safety of the train [2]; determination of the transmission-line parameters for the construction of equivalent circuit models [3]; development of advanced automatic train control systems [4], [5]. This paper deals with an issue generally disregarded by researchers in the eld, despite its great importance in the

light-rail transportation systems (LRTS) design: the dc traction power system protection and, in particular, the determination of the best location in terms of protection effectiveness and cost economies of the transient overvoltage protective devices. Presently, there is a lack of measured data on the dc power system transient surges, as well as a lack of published application literature on the characteristics of dc surge arresters [6]. In addition, there is a strong need for standard guidelines for the design of an effective protection system, since the reliability of the whole LRTS supply distribution network depends on the correct working of the surge protective devices [7], [8]. The transient overvoltages considered in this paper are those caused by indirect lightning strikes, which may occur in the vicinity of the light-rail lanes. Associated with the lightning phenomenon, there is a eld wave investing all of the conductors of the LRTS distribution network and responsible for the propagation of an overvoltage wave along the same conductors. Such a traveling wave can be modeled in a simplied way by means of a suitable voltage source placed along the line, or, more exhaustively, incorporating the effects of the incident lightning electromagnetic (EM) eld into the transmission-line equations, which describe the electrical behavior of the light-rail power-supply system [9], [10]. This latter approach enables the denition of a eld-to-line coupling model for the LRTS overhead distribution network that can be suitably implemented into the PSCAD-EMTDC environment [11], allowing the simulation of atmospheric transient surges. This paper is organized as follows: in Section II, a circuital model of a typical LRTS power system is derived. Next, in Section III, the mathematical model of the eld-to-line coupling problem is dened and the relationships between voltages and currents at the ends of the overhead distribution lines are determined. Then, in Section IV, the developed coupling model is implemented into the EM code PSCAD-EMTDC and the problem of the optimal location of the surge protective devices is investigated by means of several simulations. Finally, in Section V, some conclusive remarks are drawn. II. POWER SYSTEM MODELING

Manuscript received June 28, 2004; revised January 17, 2005. Paper no. TPWRD-00301-2004. The authors are with the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Genoa, Genova I-16145, Italy (e-mail: federico.delno@die.unige.it; rprocopio@epsl.die.unige.it; mansueto@die.unige.it). Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TPWRD.2005.852357

Generally, the supply voltage of an LRTS can vary in the range of 6001000 V dc. We consider a system powered at 750 V dc nominally with a maximum acceptable deviation of % and distributed by a system of overhead transmission

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Fig. 1.

Typical module of the LRTS network. Fig. 2. Simplied geometry of the OTL. The height h has been assumed to be equal to 5 m.

lines (OTL), supplied by parallel feeder cables. The OTL can include, for each track, a contact wire and two parallel feeder cables. The OTL of one track is connected in parallel to the OTL of the other track at each end of the route, and, in principle, at every tram stop, substation, and crossover. The running rails are used to carry the return current and constitute, with the return cables and the electrical substations (ESs) return negative busbars, the negative return system. Each ES negative busbar is connected to the rail by means of insulated cables. Every ES is fed from the electricity supply board mediumvoltage (MV) network with a supply voltage of 10.5 kV ac and frequency 50 Hz. The ES absorbs electrical power to energize the OTL at 750 V dc and to supply auxiliary loads. Each traction substation is connected to a MV generally grounded network. Usually, the electric system feeding the LRTS exhibits a modular structure. In the proposed simulations, a 500-m-long OTL has been assumed. The borders of each subsystem are represented by insulated overlaps, whose size is assumed to be about 30 cm. From the point of view of the overvoltage study, the analysis has been limited only to one subsystem, without any loss of generality. This is conrmed by the fact that an overvoltage wave coming from one section cannot propagate along another one by the presence of the insulated overlap (being the air breakdown voltage 30 kV/cm). The generic subsystem is shown in Fig. 1. The subsystem model considers both the ac and dc systems, which are briey described in the following. 1) The ac system is represented by a MV-grounded network. 2) Each traction substation is modeled by a three-windings transformer with two diode bridges connected in series forming a 12-pulse rectier conguration. 3) The contact lines, the ESs cables (length equal to about 100 m) that connect the OTL directly to the substations and the parallel feeder cables (length equal to 150 m) represent the dc section. All of the cables are supposed to be characterized by a rated impulse voltage kV [7].

Surge arresters of metal-oxide type with a rated voltage of 1.4 kV dc and a lightning impulse residual voltage of 4.08 kV have been employed. The above-mentioned model has been implemented into the EM code PSCAD-EMTDC [11]. This package describes with high details all of the system components. As surge arresters do not protect the contact line, the overvoltages to be taken into account in our simulations are those limited only by the intrinsic insulation of the contact line itself. Thus, the upper limit assumed for the overvoltages propagating from the contact line toward the cables corresponds to the impulse withstand voltage of the OTL insulators, which has been assumed equal to 20 kV. Before applying the voltage surge, the system must be led to its steady-state condition that corresponds to the dc operating voltage of 750 V. The initialization process lasts for a time , so that all of the results should be considered from onward. III. FIELD-TO-LINE COUPLING MODEL In this section, we will examine the response of the OTL wherein the source is an EM eld in the form of a uniform plane wave. The resulting equations, suitably manipulated, will enable us to develop a circuital model of the eld-to-line coupling to be interfaced with the described power distribution network. As stated in the previous section, the OTL consists of a system of two identical conductors lying at height over the ground plane, assumed as a perfect conductor (Fig. 2). The interdistance between the two conductors is supposed to be equal to 0.6 m. Neglecting the resistance and conductance matrices, the MTL equations state that [9] (1) being, respectively (2) the vector of the currents owing in the two conductors (3)

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the vector of the two conductor voltages with respect to the ground plane and the inductance and capacitance matrices and the voltage and current forcing functions, which can be written in terms of the total incident electric eld [9]

In order to set up an effective circuital model to be implemented in the PSCAD environment, the method of characteristics [9] can be applied to (12), obtaining (13) having dened

(4) (14) (5) and

As is well known, these equations can be decoupled using a linear transformation, which introduces the so-called mode and mode currents , dened as voltages (15) (6) and (7) In this case, thanks to the symmetry of the system, the matrix is given by (8) , one has Now, multiplying both members of (1) by (9), shown at the bottom of the page, where the quantities and are diagonal matrices with the following expressions: (10) being and and (11) and . being Therefore, one has to solve two uncoupled 2-conductors TL equations of the kind Equations (16) and (17) lead to the denition of the equivalent circuit of Fig. 3: where and . The same holds for the other end of the line, where one has (16) and being the eld and being the line length, wave propagation speed, being the time travel of the line, and being the modal characteristic impedances. Now recalling (6) and (7) and solving (13) with respect to the conductor voltages, one obtains

(17)

(18) and

(12)

(19)

(9)

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Fig. 3. Equivalent circuit of one of the OTL ends.

Fig. 5. LRTS conguration with arresters located at the dc busbars of each electrical substation.

Fig. 4.

Equivalent circuit of the other end of the OTL.

In this case, the equivalent circuit becomes the one depicted in Fig. 4. It is important to highlight that the model neglects the voltage induced on the underground cables since the ground is considered as a perfect conductor. A more punctual analysis would have to take into account the nite conductivity of the ground in order to evaluate the underground elds, but this would imply complex calculations and huge computational effort. IV. DETERMINATION OF THE SURGE ARRESTERS OPTIMAL LOCATION The developed model has allowed simulating the LRTS transient behavior when the system is subjected to overvoltages of atmospheric origin, such as those created by indirect lightning strikes. With reference to Fig. 2, we have assumed illuminating the OTL by a uniform plane wave, which propagates in the z-direction and whose electric eld has only a nonzero x-component

Fig. 6.

Incident electric eld of the NEMP kind.

(20) where (21) In this case, one has (22) and (23) Let us rst consider the conguration depicted in Fig. 5, where the arresters (whose earth impedance is assumed to be equal to 1 ) are located at the substations. As already mentioned in Section II, the amplitude of the electric eld is chosen in order to have an overvoltage peak of 20 kV at the OTL. In order to show how the response of the
Fig. 7. Voltage at the point A of the OTL with arresters at the ESs.

system changes according to the Fourier spectrum of the incident eld, we have considered two kinds of excitation. The rst one is characterized by s and s and, consequently, exhibits the form of a typical NEMP eld (which

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Fig. 8. Voltage at the terminal of the parallel feeder cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs.

Fig. 10.

Voltage at the ESs with arresters at the ESs.

Fig. 9. Voltage at the terminal of the ES cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs.

Fig. 11. Voltage on the most stressed diode in the conguration with the arresters positioned at the ESs and an NEMP excitation.

grows up and decays in less than s (Fig. 6) while, in the second one, we have posed s and s , in order to simulate an LEMP wave, which is much slower than the former. The results of the simulations with the NEMP excitation are presented in the following (Figs. 711), which show the OTL overvoltage measured at point A (Fig. 7), the voltages at the beginning of the parallel feeder cable (Fig. 8), and of the electrical-substation (ES) cable (Fig. 9), the voltages at the ESs (Fig. 10) and across the most stressed diode of the bridge rectier (Fig. 11). As can be noticed, the voltage at the beginning of the cables is mitigated with respect to the one along the line. This is due to the fact that the characteristic impedance of the cables is normally much smaller than the one of the contact line. As a matter of fact, the voltage at the beginning of the cables is always smaller than their rated impulse voltage kV [7]. Furthermore, the voltages at the ES are always smaller than 4.08 kV, which is the arrester threshold.

Considering now the case of the LEMP excitation, the electric eld becomes the so-called 1 2/50-ms wave, which rises to crest from 0 in about 1 ms and falls to half the amplitude in 50 ms. In this case, the following quantities have been investigated: OTL voltage, measured at point A (Fig. 12); parallel feeder cable voltage (Fig. 13); ES cable voltage (Fig. 14); ESs voltage (Fig. 15); voltage on the most stressed diode (Fig. 16). It is important to observe (Figs. 1214) that the voltages at the beginning of the ESs cable and of the parallel feeder cable are not so much mitigated, as could be expected by recalling the NEMP excitation test results; this is because the time in which the wave travels along the part of line between the application point of the overvoltage and the interface with the cable is much shorter than the duration time of the overvoltage itself. Therefore, all of the reected waves are added and the resulting voltage is not much smaller than the incoming voltage.

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Fig. 12.

Voltage at point A of the OTL.

Fig. 14. Voltage at the terminal of the ES cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs.

Fig. 13. Voltage at the terminal of the parallel feeder cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs.

Fig. 15.

Voltage at the ESs with arresters at the ESs.

The voltages at the nearest ES and across the most stressed diode show that the presence of the arresters is undoubtedly useful to protect the ES from dangerous voltage peaks. In order to prevent the cables voltage from reaching dangerous values, another conguration has been considered (Fig. 17), in which the arresters have been placed also at the interface between OTL and cables. These latter arresters have been characterized by an earth impedance of 5 , being 1 a value highly impractical to be obtained along the line. Simulating again an LEMP eld, the following quantities have been plotted: OTL voltage, measured at point A (Fig. 18); parallel feeder cable voltage (Fig. 19); ES cable voltage (Fig. 20); ESs voltage (Fig. 21); voltage on the most stressed diode (Fig. 22). Again, the voltage at the beginning of the cables is higher than the rated impulse voltage (8 kV), although smaller than the previous case. This is due to the voltage drop on the earth

impedance of the arresters, which is added to the arresters threshold. Similar to the previous case, the presence of the arresters at the ESs prevents the voltage from reaching dangerous values for their electronic devices. As a general comment, one can observe that the protection system conguration sketched in Fig. 17 is effective to limit the cables overvoltage, although more expensive than that depicted in Fig. 5. It should be highlighted that even if the peaks are smaller than the ones reached in the conguration of Fig. 5, they are still greater than 8 kV. As a useful remark, it is important to point out that we did not perform simulations without arresters since, due to the small length of the cable compared with the wavelength of the overvoltage, the voltage along the cable would be not so different from the line one. Finally, it is worth noting that the developed model has been allowed to evaluate the stress affecting the cables for a given excitation and for different protection congurations.

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Fig. 16. Voltage on the most stressed diode in the conguration with the arresters positioned at the ESs and an LEMP excitation.

Fig. 19. Voltage at the terminal of the parallel feeder cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs (earth impedance 1
) and at the interface OTL cables (earth impedance 5
).

Fig. 17. LRTS conguration with arresters positioned at the interface OTL-cables and at the ESs. Fig. 20. Voltage at the terminal of the ES cable (contact line side) with arresters at the ESs (earth impedance 1
) and at the interface OTL cables (earth impedance 5
).

Fig. 18.

Voltage at the point A of the OTL. Fig. 21. Voltage at the ESs with arresters (earth impedance 1
) at the ESs and at the interface between OTL and cables (earth impedance 5
).

Once such stress has been determined, one can choose the most appropriate conguration as well as the arresters rating, taking into account the probability that an LEMP event with a given magnitude occurs and the probability that the voltage

stress due to this event causes a discharge in the cable insulation. Furthermore, one should pay attention to the real benets

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[5] V. A. Minin, V. A. Shishliakov, J. N. Holyoak, D. A. Johnston, and N. A. Lepsky, Development of the communications-based train control system for Moscow metro, in Proc. ASME/IEEE Railroad Conf., Boston, MA, Mar. 1997, pp. 201210. [6] D. Paul, Light rail transit DC traction power system surge overvoltage protection, in Proc. IEEE Industrial Commercial Power Systems Tech. Conf., New Orleans, LA, May 2001, pp. 8390. [7] Railway ApplicationsInsulation Coordination. Part II: Overvoltages and Related Protection, Mar. 2001. EN 50 124-2. [8] Railway Applications. Supply Voltages of Traction System, Nov. 1995. EN 50 163. [9] C. R. Paul, Analysis of Multiconductor Transmission Lines. New York: Wiley, 1994. [10] F. Tesche, M. Ianoz, and T. Karlsson, EMC Analysis Methods and Computational Models. New York: Wiley, 1997. [11] PSCAD-EMTDC Version 3.0, the Professionals Tool for Electromagnetic Transients Simulation, 2001. Manitoba HVDC Research Centre, Inc.

Fig. 22. Voltage on the most stressed diode in the conguration with arresters (earth resistance 1
) located at the ESs and at the interface between OTL and cables (earth impedance 5
).

derived from placing arresters at the interface OTL cables in order to obtain lower peaks with respect to the costs of a more complicated protection system. V. CONCLUSIONS AND PERSPECTIVES In this paper, the response of a typical light-rail transit dc traction power system to overvoltage waves of atmospheric origin has been investigated. A eld-to-line coupling model of the system has been developed and implemented into the EM code PSCAD-EMTDC in order to determine the optimal location of the surge arresters for the overvoltage protection. Further activity is in progress in order to improve the coupling model with a more detailed and exhaustive description of the eld originated by the lightning discharge. REFERENCES
[1] Fact Sheet N. 102, Jul. 2000. Light Rail Transit Association, U.K. Development Group. [2] G. Joos, R. Kapila, and R. Friem, Electromagnetic interference issues in the specication of AC and DC propulsion systems for light rail vehicles, in Proc. ASME/IEEE Railroad Conf., Philadelphia, PA, Apr. 1998, pp. 4147. [3] R. J. Hill and S. Brillante, Portable measurement equipment for site determination of rail track parameters, in Proc. ASME/IEEE Railroad Conf., Philadelphia, PA, Apr. 1998, pp. 5964. [4] S. P. Gordon, Coordinated train control and energy management control strategies, in Proc. ASME/IEEE Railroad Conf., Philadelphia, PA, Apr. 1998, pp. 165176.

Federico Delno (M03) was born in Savona, Italy, on February 28, 1972. He received the Ph.D. degree from the University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy, in 2001. Currently, he is a Researcher in the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Genoa. His research interests are electromagnetic-eld theory, numerical techniques applied to EM compatibility, and transmission-line modeling. He is the author or coauthor of many scientic papers presented at international conferences and published in reviewed journals.

Renato Procopio (S03) was born in Savona, Italy, on March 6, 1974. He received the Ph.D. degree from the University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy, in 2004. Currently, he is a Researcher in the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Genoa. He works on lightning return stroke current modeling and transmission-line theory as well as on power-quality improvement in distribution networks. He is the author or coauthor of many scientic papers presented at international conferences and published in reviewed journals.

Mansueto Rossi was born in Savona, Italy, on April 10, 1974. He received the Ph.D. degree from the University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy, in 2004. Currently, he is a Researcher in the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Genoa. His research interests focus on integral equations in electromagnetic (EM) eld theory and numerical techniques applied to (EM) compatibility. He is the author or coauthor of more than 30 scientic papers presented at international conferences and published in reviewed journals.

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