Panel Session on Data for Modeling System Transients
Insulated Cables
Bjørn Gustavsen
SINTEF Energy Research
N-7465 Trondheim, Norway
bjorn.gustavsen@energy.sintef.no
Abstract: The available EMTP-type programs have dedicated
support routines (Cable Constants) for calculating an electric
representation of cable systems in terms of a series
impedance matrix Z and a shunt admittance matrix Y, based
on cable data defined by geometry and material properties. Z
and Y are then used as the basic input for the various cable
models applied in time domain transient simulations. This
paper describes necessary procedures for converting the
available cable data into a new set of data which can be used
as input for Cable Constants. In particular, the paper shows
how to handle the semiconducting screens of single core
coaxial type cables. In situations where the cable plays an
important role in the transient simulation, the user should
also consider obtaining a specimen of the cable in order to
verify the geometrical data provided by the manufacturer. The
recommendations in this paper are supported by field test
results.
Keywords: Electromagnetic Transients, Insulated Cables,
Modeling, EMTP.
I. INTRODUCTION
The modeling of insulated cables for the simulation of electromagnetic
transients requires
1) Calculation of cable parameters from geometrical data and material
properties [1],[2].
2) Conversion of the cable parameters into a new set of parameters
for usage by the transmission line/cable model.
This paper deals with the first step in the procedure, namely the
calculation of cable parameters. All the commonly used programs for
simulation of electromagnetic transients (EMTP/ATP/EMTDC) have
dedicated support routines for this task. The routine(s) have very
similar features and will in this presentation be given the common
generic name “Cable Constants” (CC).
Data conversion is often needed by the user in order to bring the
available cable data into a form which can be used as input by CC. This
conversion is needed because
1) The data can have alternative representations with CC only
supporting one of the representations.
2) The CC routine does not consider certain cable features, such as
semiconducting screens and wire screens.
1
The situation is made further complicated by the fact that the
nominal thickness of the various layers (insulation, semiconducting
screens) as stated by manufacturers can be smaller than the actual
(design) thickness of the layers. Therefore, the information on
geometrical data from the manufacturer can be inaccurate from the
viewpoint of cable parameter calculations.
This paper demonstrates the needed conversions for one real case
of a single core coaxial cable system, and proposes how to best use the
available data to produce a reliable cable model. The effect of inaccurate
data on a time domain simulation is also shown. The paper further
discusses the shortcoming of CC in taking into account possible
attenuation effects caused by the semiconducting screens.
II. CABLE PARAMETERS
The basic parameters used by transmission line/cable models are the
following:
Z (ω) = R(ω) + jωL (ω) (1)
Y (ω) = G (ω) + jωC(ω) (2)
where R,L,G,C are the series resistance, series inductance, shunt
conductance and shunt capacitance per unit length of the cable system.
These quantities are n by n matrices where n is the number of
(parallel) conductors of the cable system. The variable ω reflects that
these quantities are calculated as function of frequency. Z and Y are
calculated using CC based on the geometry and material properties of
the system [1],[2].
III. ACTUAL CABLE VS. CABLE CONSTANTS
REPRESENTATION
A. Geometry
In the following we consider CC applied to systems of parallel single
core coaxial type cables (SC cables). The user must specify the
following input data:
• The location of each cable (x-y coordinates).
• The geometry of each SC cable.
In general, CC represents each SC cable by a set of concentrically
located homogenous pipes, separated by insulating layers. Figure 1
shows the representation which would be used for a SC cable without
armour.
 air cables. This means that CC assumes a cylindrically symmetrical
soil x current distribution in all conductors. The assumed cylindrical
distribution also means that the helical winding effect of the wire
y
ρg , µ g screen is not taken into account.

IV. MODELING REQUIREMENTS VS. PHENOMENON

Insulation
r4 For situations with straight sheaths (i.e. no crossbondings), high
r3 frequency transients propagate mainly as uncoupled coaxial waves
within each SC cable. The earth characteristics have in this situation
core ρ c, µc r2
r1 only a mild effect on the resulting phase voltages and phase currents.
sheath In the following we shall therefore focus on the representation of the
ε1 cable within the protective jacket (oversheath).
ρs , µs ε2
V. CONVERSION PROCEDURES

Fig. 1 CC representation of system of 3 SC cables A. Core

Figure 2 shows an actual XLPE single core coaxial cable. Clearly, The CC-routine requires the core data to be given by the resistivity ρc
this cable design is different from the simple configuration assumed in and the radius r1. However, the core conductor is often of the stranded
Figure 1. In particular, the user needs to decide how to represent design (Figure 2), whereas CC assumes a homogenous (solid)
• The core stranding conductor. This makes it necessary to increase the resistivity ρ′c of
• The inner semiconducting screen the core material to take into account the space between strands:
• The outer semiconducting screen πr12
• The wire screen (sheath) ρc = ρc′ (5)
Ac
where Ac is the efficient (nominal) cross sectional area of the core. The
Inner semiconductor
Outer semiconductor
resistivity ρ′c for to be used for annealed copper and hard drawn
Wire screen aluminum at 20°C is according to IEC 28 and IEC 889:
Copper: 1.7241E-8 Ωm
Aluminum 2.8264E-8 Ωm
If the manufacturer provides the DC resistance for the core, the
sought resistivity can alternatively be calculated as
πr 2
ρc = R DC 1 (6)
Core l
Insulation
B. Insulation and semiconducting screens
Procedure
Fig. 2 SC XLPE cable The semiconducting screens can have a substantial effect on the
propagation characteristics of a cable in terms of velocity, surge
B. Material properties impedance and possibly the attenuation [3],[4]. Unfortunately, CC
does not allow explicit representation of the semiconducting screens,
The user must specify the following material constants:
so an approximate data conversion procedure must be applied :
• The soil resistivity and relative permeability ρ g , µg
• The core resistivity and relative permeability ρ c , µc 1) Calculate r2 as r1 plus the sum of the thickness of the
• The sheath resistivity and relative permeability ρ s , µs semiconducting screens and the main insulation.
• The insulation relative permittivity εr 2) Calculate the relative permittivity εr1 as
(In non-magnetic materials the relative permeability equals 1.0.) C ln(r2 / r1 )
εr1 = (7)
2πε 0
The CC-routine assumes the relative permittivity εr of each insulating
layer to be real (ε ′′ = 0 ) and frequency independent, thereby where C is the cable capacitance stated by the manufacturer and
neglecting any relaxation phenomena in the insulation. This implies : ε0 = 8.854E-12. If C is unknown, εr1 can instead be calculated based on
Z (ω) = R(ω) + jωL (ω) (3) the relative permittivity εrins of the main insulation:

Y (ω) = jωC (4) ε r1 = εr ins

ln(r2 / r1 )
(8)
ln(b / a )
C. Eddy current effects
where a and b are the insulation inner and outer radius, respectively.
The CC-routine takes into account the frequency dependent skin effect For XLPE εrins equals 2.3.
in the conductors, but neglects the proximity effect between parallel
2
Justification With a relative permittivity of 2.3 for XLPE, this defines a
The inner and outer semiconducting screens have a relative permittivity capacitance of 0.244 nF/m which is in agreement with the capacitance
of the order of 1000, due to the high carbon content used in the of 0.24 nF/m stated by the manufacturer.
semiconducting screens. This implies that the capacitance of the
C. Data conversion
screens is much higher than that of the insulation and will tend to act as
a short circuit when calculating the shunt admittance between core and Core
sheath. A similar effect is caused by the ohmic conductivity of the From the manufacturer:
semiconducting screens, which is required by norm to be higher than
r1 = 19 .5 mm
1E-3 S/m.
The resistivity is calculated by (6) :
At the same time the conductivity of the semiconducting screens is
much lower than that of the core and the sheath conductors, implying ρ c = 3. 4643⋅ 10 −8 Ù/m
that the semiconducting screens do not contribute to the longitudinal
Insulation and insulation screens
current conduction.
This implies that when entering the geometrical data in CC, the r2 = r1 + (0 .8 + 14 + 0. 4) = 34 .7 mm
user should let the XPLE insulation extend to the surface of the core εr 1 = 2 .486 (by (7))
conductor and the sheath conductor, and increase the relative
permittivity to leave the capacitance unaltered. Note that this modeling Wire screen
neglects the possible attenuation caused by the semiconducting The outer radius is calculated using (9):
screens. The attenuation could have a strong impact on very high r3 = 34 . 93 mm
frequency transients. This is discussed in Section X.
ρs = 1 .718 E − 8 Ù/m (copper)
C. Wire screen
When the sheath conductor consists of a wire screen, the most VII. INACCURACY IN DATA FROM MANUFACTURER
practical procedure is to replace the screen with a tubular conductor The relevant cable norms (e.g. IEC 840, IEC 60502) puts limitations on
having a cross sectional area equal to the total wire area As. With an the minimum thickness of each cable layer (in relation to the nominal
inner sheath radius of r2, the outer radius r3 becomes thickness), but not on the maximum thickness. Therefore, the
As manufacturer is free to use thicker layers than the nominal ones, e.g. to
r3 = + r22 (9)
π account for dispersity in production and ageig effects. This situation is
prevalent for both the main insulation, the oversheath, and the
VI. APPLICATION TO 66 kV CABLE semiconducting screens.
By measurement on a specimen of the 66 kV cable it was found
A. Manufacturer’s data that the insulation and in particular the semiconducting screens were
The procedures outlined in the previous sections will be demonstrated thicker than stated in the data sheets :
for a 66 kV cable similar to the one shown in Figure 3. For this cable Thickness of inner insulation screen: 1.5 mm
(manufactured in the 1980’s), the following data were provided by the Thickness of insulation: 14.7 mm
manufacturer: Thickness of outer insulation screen: 1.1 mm
Ac = 1000 mm2 Separation between outer insulation screen and centre of
C = 0 .24 nF/m each conductor in wire screen: 1 mm
R DC = 2 .9 E − 5 Ù/m This gives a modified model :
r1 = 19 .5 mm r1 = 19 .5 mm
Thickness of inner insulation screen: 0.8 mm r2 = 37 .8 mm
Thickness of insulation: 14 mm ε r 2 = 2. 856 (by (7))
Thickness of outer insulation screen: 0.4 mm
Wire screen: As = 50 mm2
B. Data consistency
In Section VB it was justified that the insulation screens can be
represented by short circuit when calculating the shunt admittance.
This is equivalent to a capacitance between two cylindrical shells with
radius :
a = (19 .5 + 0 .8 ) mm = 20 .3 mm
b = a + 14 mm = 34 .3 mm
2πε 0 εr
C= (10)
ln(b / a )
3
 VIII. SENSITIVITY the surge admittance of the cable core-sheath loop, which is the inverse
of the surge impedance.
At high frequencies, the asymptotic (lossless) propagation velocity
The inrush current was also simulated using EMTDC v3 with a
and surge impedance are given as
phase domain cable model [5],[6]. The CC routine was applied for the
v = 1 / L 0C (11) three different cases defined in Section VIII. It is seen that using the
cable representation in case #3 gives a calculated response which is in
Zc = L0 / C (12)
fairly close agreement with the measured response. The two other
where representations have a much larger discrepancy. (The spike occurring
µ0
L0 = ln(r2 / r1 ) (13) at about 50 µs resulted because of long leads connecting the two cable
2π sections).
with µ0 = 4π E − 7
We will now compare the asymptotic propagation characteristics
as calculated by the following procedures:
Case #1:
Neglecting the semiconducting screens. Capacitance and inductance
calculated using (10) and (13) with a=r1=19.5 mm, b=r2=33.5 mm, and
εr1=2.3.
Case #2:
Taking the semiconducting screens into account. Capacitance and
geometrical data from the manufacturer: r1=19.5 mm, r2=34.7 mm, and
εr1=2.486.
Case #3:
Taking the semiconducting screens into account. Capacitance from the
manufacturer, geometrical data from cable specimen: r1=19.5 mm,
r2=37.8 mm, and εr1=2.856.
Using the inductance calculated from (12), the velocity and Fig. 4 Measured and simulated inrush current
characteristic impedance are calculated as:
Table 1. Sensitivity of cable propagation characteristics X. IMPROVED MODELING OF SEMICONDUCTING
SCREENS
case #1 case #2 case #3
Reference [3] suggests to model the admittance between the core and
v [m/µs] 197.7 190.1 (-3.8%) 177.4 (-10.3%)) the sheath using the circuit in Figure 5, in which each semiconducting
screen is modeled by a conductance in parallel with a capacitor. With
Zc [Ω] 21.39 21.91 (+2.4%) 23.49 (+9.8%)
component values obtained from measurements, they obtained a good
Thus, the cable propagation characteristics are highly sensitive to agreement between measured attenuation and calculated attenuation in
the representation of the core-sheath layers. the range 1 MHz–125 MHz. The attenuation effect of the
semiconducting screens was strong.
IX. FIELD TEST AND TIME DOMAIN SIMULATION Reference [4] gives a systematic investigation of the effects of
semiconducting screens on propagation characteristics.
A field test was carried out on a 6.05 km length of the cable. One core
conductor was charged up to a 5 kV DC voltage and then shorted to
core
ground. Thus, a negative step voltage was in effect applied to the cable
end (see Figure 3).
3.85 km 2.2 km Inner semiconducting screen
15 m G1 C1
core
sheath
Y Main insulation
C

Negative
step voltage G2 C2 Outer semiconducting screen

sheath
Fig. 5 Improved model of insulation screens [3]
Fig. 3 Cable test setup
The conductivity and permittivity of the semiconducting screens
Figure 4 shows the measured initial inrush current flowing into the core depends very much on the amount of carbon added, the structure of
conductor in p.u. of the DC-voltage. The initial current corresponds to
4
the carbon, and the type of base polymer. Very high carbon
concentrations are used (e.g. 35%). IEC 840 requires the resistivity to
be lower than 1000 Ωm for the inner screen, and below 500 Ωm for
the outer screen. One manufacturer stated that they use a much lower
resistivity, typically 0.1 Ωm–10 Ωm. The relative permittivity is
very high, typically of the order of 1000. The permittivity and
conductivity can be strongly frequency dependent.
In order to investigate the possible attenuation effects of the
insulation screens of the cable considered in this paper, a
representation as in Figure 5 was employed assuming frequency
independent conductances and capacitances. The component values
were calculated as follows:
C = 0. 24 nF / m (from manufacturer)
C1 = 2πε0 εr / ln(r2 / b)
C 2 = 2πε 0 ε r / ln(a / r1 )
G1 = 2πσ / ln(r2 / b )
G 2 = 2πσ / ln(a / r1 )
where
a: Outer radius of inner semiconducting screen
b: Inner radius of outer semiconducting screen
εr : Relative permittivity of semiconducting screens
σ: Conductivity of semiconducting screens
Figure 6 shows the attenuation per km, for a few combinations of
σ and εr. The curves define to which peak value a sinusoidal voltage of
1 p.u. peak value decays to over a distance of 1 km. (The signal decays
exponentially as function of length). The model predicts a significant
contribution from the semiconducting screens for a low value of both
the relative permittivity (10, 100) and the conductivity (0.001). With
the high permittivity (1000), the capacitance tends to short out the
conductance, and no appreciable increase of the attenuation is seen.
The lowest value for the permittivity (10) is probably unrealistic.
Fig. 6 Effect of semiconducting screens on attenuation
XIV. BIOGRAPHY
5
XI. DISCUSSION
This paper has focused on the importance of correctly modeling the
semiconducting screens of single core coaxial type cables. It is shown
that a careless modeling tends to produce a model with a too low surge
impedance and a too high propagation velocity. The importance of
accurate modeling is strongly dependent on the type of transient
study. If the cable is part of a resonant overvoltage phenomenon, the
accurate representation of the cable the surge impedance and
propagation velocity is crucial.
XII. CONCLUSIONS
This paper describes necessary conversion procedures for the available
cable data for usage by Cable Constants–type routines (CC), with
focus on single core (SC) coaxial type cables. The main conclusions are
the following:
• CC does not directly apply to SC cables with semiconducting
screens, so a conversion procedure is needed before entering the
cable data into CC. This paper describes the needed conversions
and also describes the conversions needed for handling the core
stranding and wire screens.
• The nominal thickness of the various insulation and
semiconducting cable screens as stated by manufacturers can be
smaller than those found in actual cables. This can result in a
significant error for the propagation characteristics of the cable
model.
• CC has no means for taking into account any additional attenuation
at very high frequencies resulting from the semiconducting screens.
XIII. REFERENCES
[1] L.M. Wedepohl and D.J. Wilcox, “Transient Analysis of
Underground Power Transmission System ; System-Model and
Wave Propagation Characteristics”, Proc. IEE, vol. 120, No. 2,
February 1973, pp. 252-259.
[2] A. Ametani, “A General Formulation of Impedance and
Admittance of Cables”, IEEE Trans. PAS, Vol. 99, No. 3,
May/June 1980, pp. 902-909.
[3] G.C. Stone and S.A. Boggs, "Propagation of Partial Discharge
Pulses in Shielded Power Cable”, Proceedings of Conference on
Electrical Insulation and Dielectric Phenomena, IEEE 82CH1773-
1, October 1982, pp. 275-280.
[4] W.L. Weeks and Yi Min Diao, “Wave Propagation in
Underground Power Cable”, IEEE Trans. PAS, Vol. 103, No. 10,
October 1984, pp. 2816-2826.
[5] A. Morched, B. Gustavsen, and M. Tartibi, “A Universal Line
Model for Accurate Calculation of Electromagnetic Transients on
Overhead Lines and Cables”, IEEE trans. PWRD, vol. 14, no. 3,
July 1999, pp. 1032-1038.
[6] B.Gustavsen, G. Irwin, R. Mangelrød, D. Brandt, and K. Kent,
"Transmission Line Models for the Simulation of Interaction
Phenomena between Parallel AC and DC Overhead Lines",
IPST'99 International Conference on Power System Transients,
Budapest, 1999, pp. 61-67.
Bjørn Gustavsen was born in Norway in 1965. He received the
M.Sc. degree in 1989 and the Dr.-Ing. degree in 1993, both from the
Norwegian Institute of Technology in Trondheim. Since 1994 he
has been working at SINTEF Energy Research (former EFI). His
interests include simulation of electromagnetic transients and
modeling of frequency dependent effects. He spent 1996 as a
Visiting Researcher at the University of Toronto, and the summer
of 1998 at the Manitoba HVDC Research Centre, Winnipeg,
Canada.

APPENDIX – DATA CONVERSION

The following Matlab code does the recommended data conversion

for the case described in Section VI. All geometrical quantities are in
meters.

INPUT:

C =0.24e-9; %capacitance stated by manufacturer [F/m]

Acore =1000e-6; %core nominal cross sectional area
Asheath=50e-6; %sheath nominal cros sectional area
tins =14e-3; %thickness: main insulation
tins1 =0.8e-3; %thickness: inner insulation screen
tins2 =0.4e-3; %thickness: outer insulation screen
r1 =19.5e-3; %core radius
RDC =2.9e-5; %core DC resistance [ohm/m]
eps0 =8.854e-12; %vacuum permittivity

OUTPUT:

rhoc=RDC*pi*r1^2 %core resistivity

r2=r1+tins1+tins+tins2; %sheath inner radius
r3=sqrt(Asheath/pi+r2^2); %sheath outer radius
epsr1=C*log(r2/r1)/(2*pi*eps0); %effective rel. permittivity
%of core sheath layer