Proceedngs of /EEE TENCON02

A SIMPLIFIED METHOD FOR CALCULATING THE IMPULSE

RESISTANCE OF VERTICAL GROUNDING RODS

" ZHANG Xiaoqing

. (Departmeni of Electric Eiigiiieering, Nodiem Jiaotong Uiuversity. Beijiiig 160044. China)

Email: zsqiong@hotmail.co~n

Abstract: A simplified inethod is proposed for calculating
the impulse resistance, of vertical grounding. rods. The
analytic formula is first derived to determine the low current
resistance and then the calculation procedun: is developed
10 estimate the impulse resistance. In Ure procedure, a
noillinear relationship is introduced to characterize the
electric field .and current density in the ionization zone
surrounding the grounding rod. The effective radius of the
grounding rod is evaluated according to the nonlinear
relationslup. The impulse resistance is calculated by
substituting tlic cffcctivc radius into thc analytic formula of
the low current resistance. Finally. a comparison is made
between calculated and measured risulls in coifinnation of
tlie validiF of the proposed niethod.
Key words: grounding rod. impulse rcsistance. ground
potential rise.
1. Introduction
Thc impulse pcrfomiaicc of grounding clcctrodcs is
important for the lightiiing protection design of civil
buildings aid electric substations. An appropriate choice
of protection measures against lightning overvoltage
dcpcnds to a largc dcgrcc on thc knowledgc of thc inipnlsc
behavior of gromidiiig electrodes during lightning current
dissipation. One of the basic parameters describing the
impulse behavior is the impulse resistance, by which the
p d potential rise level can be evaluated conveniently
'I, As tlie simplest fonu. of groundiug electrodes, verticjll
grouuding rods are widely used in practical grounding
systeiiis. The impulse resistance of vertical groiiiiding rods
has been shrdied for many years. Althoiiph a few
calculation methods were presented by differelit authors
12-11
. their modeling for soil brealidow is still a problem.
These previoiis methods usually utilized a linear
relatioilship to characterize the electnc field and curreut
densih in the ioiiization zoue siirroimdiog the.grouiiding
rod. In fact, tlic relationship has pronounced nonlinearity.
for @pica1 kinds of soil in terms of the esperiniental
investigation '*I. The nonlinear relationship should be
taken into accoimt in order to perrorm more accurate
calcnlation of the impulse resistance.
The aioi of this paper is to propose an eEcieiit method
rods. The grounding rods under consideration are assumed
to be not quite long and their inductaxe and capacitance
may be neglected. The proposed. method utilizes the
nonlinear characteristic to represent the relatioilship
between the electric field and curreut density in the
ionization zone. A reasonable simplification is made for
the soil brealtdown. Based,on the simplified treatment, the
calculatioii procedure is developed to determine tlie
effective,radins of the grounding rod. Then: the effective
radios is used to calculate tlie impulse resistance.
Validity of thc proposcd iilctbod ievcrificd by comparing
calculated and measured results.
2. Low Current Resistance
Whcn a low ciirrcnt I with low frcqucncy is injected
into a vertical grounding rod and iiisuficient to initiate
soil brealidowi, the relatioilship between the electric field
and corrent density in the soil is linear. i.e.
E=pJ (1)
where E is the electric field intensity, P the soil resistivity
and J . the ciurent density. The equipotential surface
surroundiug the groimding rod is approximately
represented by a cylindrical portion. and a semispherical
portion[2,61,
as sbown in Fig. I . Correspoiidingly, the
Fig. 1 Low current resistance model free of soil breakdown
I -vertical grounding rod. 2-equipotential surface
ciirrent density can be expressed as
I I
.I = ~
~

for calculating tlie impulse resistance of verhcal grounding 2Kd + 2K rZ 2K r(r + I )

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Snbstimting cqn. 2 into eqii. 1, thc clcctric ficld intensity constant rcsistivity zonc. For simplicity, this process can
can be written as be described by a simplified modelr91shown in Fig.3. In
the simplified model, the semiconductive 7mie is
E= (3) neglected since it is small, while the streamer and arc
2n r ( r + I )
zones are modeled as an ionization zone. The border of the
The ground poteutial rise U generated by the grounding ionization zone is delimited by the critical value &. A
rod is derived from the integration for eqn. 3 nonlinear relationship is introduced to characterize the
electric field and current density in the ionization zone.
The nonlinear relationship is denoted in the following
E=aJ" (6)
Therefore. the low current resistance of the grounding rod where and b are constants that were given for typical
call be found kinds of soil in ref. 8. Substituting eqn. 2 into eqn. 6: the

(5)

7
The above expression is identical to Liew's expression [I' ...........!
which was obtained by other method. As a numerical .................
................. ! ................I
example, values of rc, 1 and P are taken to be 0.025m,
I

p-.".."
I ..........................
................I
I
.............. .................
, ~.~.~,~.~.~.'
................1
.
Im and 42.3 Q . 111, respectively. The resistance &
calculated by eqn. S is 21.3 Q while its measiued
is 23.2Q. Obviously, h e former is conformable to the
..................
,,.........................................
I
..... j .'.'.'.','.~!
I.......................................
~

latter. ..................
3. Impulse Resistance
For a high impulse current with crest value Im: I
._
-.
.......................
7
I
representative of lightning, the impulse resistaxe of the
Fig. 3 Simplified model of ionization zone
grounding rod is defined as a ratio of the crest value of
impulse ground potential rise to Im.When the electric field electric field intensity is rewritten as
intensit? 011 the surface of the grounding rod exceeds the
critical value E, of soil ionization gradient, the breakdown Ib 1
will occur. This process is illustraled in Fig. 2. As the E = </L ( 7;

current increases, streamers are developed and in (2n)b

. . rb(r
turn arcs are generated. Within the streamer and an:zones, On the border of the ionization zone: E should satisfy the
boundary condition

Thus, the boundary radius of the ionization zone can be

dcrivcd from cqns. 7 and 8
y = -I+=
H 2
where

The soil breakdown is basically equivalent to an increase

Fig. 2 Impulse breakdown of soil surrounding a vehcal
grounding rod I -arc zone. 2 -streamer zone, 3 -
sciiuconductivc zonc. 4 -constant rcsistivity mnc
the resistivih decreases from its original valne to a limit of
approaching conductor. In addition, there is a
semiconductive zone behveen the streamer zone and the
in the dimension of the grounding rod. This increase can
be represented by an effective radius reof the grounding
rod, as shown in Fig.4. The voltage between the
grounding rod and the border of the ionization zone is
where

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 4. Comparison of Calculated and Measured Results
To check the validity of the proposed method, a
comparison is made between calculated and measured
.results. In the comparison, the first set of data are:
r0=0.0127ni, 1=3.05m, P =87.2 . Q . m , &=~27kv/lil:
~ 3 0 9 4 . 6 ,b=0.5 1. The impulse resistances at differeut
current crest values are calculated by eqn.12, which are
shown in Fig. 5 together with the measured result [lo'
The secoud set of data are: r'o=0.025nI, I=lm.
, 0 4 3 . 5 0 . m; Ec=350kV/m, 0=219.05, h=0.82. The crest
valuesof impulse ground potential rise calculated by

._....
Measured
20
Calculatcd
16
Fig. 1 Sketch for evaluation of the effective radius
h
c ..
1-ionization zone. 2-constant resistivity P zone y 12
4:
The voltage betweeu lhe equivalent grounding rod aud Uie
equipotential surface with radius r . is~

Because 11, and U, mist be equal, the effective radius re

cai be detenniued by equs. 9 aud 11

re = rIi I
rH( A - I)+ /z I
where -I =exp( U ) aud

k[
w =

~~

2 k=l 'i.' 'i-'

allb-'
p(2ir)b.'

+I)b
where A I' is the radial step aud
1
D

As Lhe iiitegratioii oC eqn. 10 is dillicull to be calculated

analytically, a nunierical computation procedure is
implemented to obtaiu D
D = -Ar.
+ 1
r;"(r, + I)b ?
.

I-
250

200

150
-
-

-
-/
..
..._..
Measured

r-
,-

a=- - 0' p 100 -

AI.
By replacing r.<, with re in eqn 5 : the impulse resistance
R,,,c m bc g h i
0 J

27r I 0 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32 .
In eqn 12, since the effective radius r, varies with the I, (kA)
current crest value I,2,, the impulse resistance Ri,, is
dependetit 011 Also: tbe crest value 1hnz of impulse Fig. 6 Calculated and measured crest values of impulse
groiuid potential rise cau be evaluated as follows
5. Conclusion
U;,,= R,, I , (13) A simplified method for calculating the impulse

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resistaiice'of vertical~grouiidingrods has been proposed in
this paper. 'For a vertical grounding rod dissipating high '

iinpolse current, tlie soil breakdowi process is niodeledPy

an ioiiization zone snrrounding it. In the ionization zone, a
nonlinear relationship is introduced to ,characterize the
electric field aiid current density instead of the traditional
linear relationship used in the previous methods. The
effective radius of tlie grounding rod is estimated in tenns
of~thenonlinear relationship. Then, the impulse resistance
is obtained by means of the effective radius and the
ground potential rise level is also evaluated from the
impulse resistance aiid current crest. The calculated results
have been coinpared with the measured ones and a better
agreement. appears between them, which verifies the
validity of the proposed method.

Acknowledgement
This work is financially supported by University Key
Teacher Foundation of Education Ministry and Natural
Science Foitndation of Beijing.

Reference
1 GB 50057-94. Desinii Code for Protection of Structures
&
a& Lightning (National Code of China), 2000
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impulse characteristics of concentrated earth," Pmc.
IEE.Vo1.121: pp.123 - 135,Feh. 1974
3. R.Velazquez and D. Mukhedkar, " Analytical
iiiodeling of grounding electrodes transient behavior,"
IEEE Puns. Power Appurutirs ant Systems,
'Vol.PAS-103, pp.1314-1322$ Jmi. 1984
4. E. Garbagiiati >.A.Gcri and, G Sartorio and G M.Veca,
"Non-linear behavior of ground electrodes under
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comparison with experimental results", IEEE Puns.
Mugnetics, Vol. 28: pp.1442-1445, Mar. 1992
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+

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% m s . P ~ ~ ~ D e l i Vol.
~ e i14,
y ,pp.1008-1017, Jul.
1999
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9. A. R. Hilemai. Iiisulation Coordination for Power
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10. P. L.' Bellaschi, R. E. Aniiington and A. E. Snowden,
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349 - 363,1942

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