On-line Partial Discharge Localization of 10-kV Covered Conductor Lines

This paper proposes an innovative partial discharge (PD) location technique for overhead electrical power distribution networks. It is aimed at improving the condition-based maintenance of the network. PD localization is carried out via an improved double-sided traveling-wave method. The method is driven by a hybrid detection technique, which integrates a pulse-based synchronization mechanism and a global positioning system (GPS). The proposed solution offers a number of benefits. It has the nice inherent feature of being immune to varying physical parameters of the transmission line, and it has been proven be offer improved accuracy with respect of the conventional GPS-based location methods. Also, an in-house designed portable and non-invasive test setup is presented and thoroughly discussed, thus demonstrating the feasibility of the proposed method. Moreover, an enhanced algorithm is embedded into the PD location system to improve robustness to high-level noise. Finally, the proposed tool relies on a well-established automatic procedure which requires neither parameter tuning nor any expert intervention. The features and strengths of the method are validated on a real case consisting of a 2125-m long 10-kV overhead covered conductor line.