IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 16, NO.

3, JULY 2001 385

Optimal Computation of Distance Relays Second

Zone Timing in a Mixed Protection Scheme with
Directional Overcurrent Relays
Luis G. Pérez, Senior Member, IEEE and Alberto J. Urdaneta, Senior Member, IEEE

Abstract—This paper describes a technique to determine the op-

timal time setting for the second zone of distance relays when used
in a mixed protection scheme with directional overcurrent relays.
The technique consists of including the second zone operation time
as a new variable in the original problem statement of optimal com-
putation of directional overcurrent relays settings. It is shown that
the influence of distance relays and directional overcurrent relays
must be considered when the settings of these relays are computed.
Numerical results obtained with the proposed method for a real-
istic power system are presented.
Index Terms—Optimization techniques, power system protec-
tion, relay coordination.

I. INTRODUCTION
Fig. 1. Coordination between DOCR.

T HE PROBLEM of finding the time dial setting of di-

rectional overcurrent relays (DOCR) has been stated
and solved using linear programming [1], [2]. This technique
As explained in [2], the original equations (1)–(3) can be
stated in terms of a the relays time dial settings by using a
is based on the mathematical statement of the sensitivity,
proper representation of the relay operation times as functions
speed, security and selectivity conditions associated with the
of . Since the operation time of a given relay “ ” for faults at
traditional relay coordination problem. The basic optimization
zone can be approximated by an equation of the type:
problem, in terms of the relay operation times has the following
basic form:

minimize: the resulting equations are [2]:

(1)
minimize:
subject to:
(4)
(2)
(3) subject to:
(5)
where
operation time of relay ; (6)
and denote the main and backup relays where is the total number of DOCR, , and .
operation times over a given power Equations (4)–(6) have the form of a standard linear program-
system protection zone ; and ming problem, since coefficients e are determined for the rele-
time coordination interval. vant faults. Once the auxiliary variables are determined, each
Constraints of type (3), are stated according to a set of coordi- can be calculated as the solution of [2].
nation pairs previously determined; and the relay times for each
pair are determined only for a set of relevant faults in the II. CONSIDERATION OF DISTANCE RELAYS
zone , which is the zone where is the main relay. Fig. 1
shows the case of two DOCR with similar inverse-time charac- Recently, a procedure to include backup definite-time relays
teristic, where the relevant faults are determined by points in the process of computing the time dial settings of DOCR
and . with inverse time – curves was presented [2]. This is useful in
transmission and subtransmission systems which have a mixed
scheme with DOCR and distance relays. For the particular case
Manuscript received February 10, 2000.
The authors are with the Universidad Simón Bolívar, Caracas, Venezuela. of the coordination of DOCR with the second zone of distance
Publisher Item Identifier S 0885-8977(01)04680-5. relays, it was proposed to use two constraints (see Fig. 2). One
0885–8977/01$10.00 © 2001 IEEE
386 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 16, NO. 3, JULY 2001

Fig. 2. Coordination between DOCR and distance relays.

Fig. 3. Determination of point F 4.

of the constraints states that the directional overcurrent backup

relay of a given coordination pair must be slower than the second
zone of the distance relay associated to the main circuit breaker,
this means:

(7) Fig. 4. Sample system.

where is a time coordination interval which does not have

to be the same used in the selectivity constraints between the bound-type constraints for the time dial settings. As is
DOCR. Notice that the operation time of the DOCR is eval- previously fixed, constraints of the (7), (8) type could lead to
uated at point (Fig. 2), where the second zone of distance a nonfeasible situation, indicating the impossibility of finding
relay at starts. The other constraint states that the second zone a selective set of settings. Thus must be manually changed
of the backup circuit breaker must be slower than the DOCR until the optimization problem is feasible.
of the main circuit breaker , as follows:
III. OPTIMUM SECOND ZONE TIMING
(8)
The new approach consists of including as one of the
For this last constraint, the operation time of the main DOCR
variables in the coordination problem. As is the same for all
is evaluated at point , which corresponds to the ohmic reach
relays, there is only one variable to add to the original problem.
of the second zone of the distance relay associated with the
Constraints (7) and (8) become:
backup circuit breaker. This point is determined with an equa-
tion that includes the relay polar characteristic. For example, for (11)
a MHO distance relay the limit (reach) is given by: (12)
(9) where . The sum of the objective function (4) is now
In (9), is the second zone ohmic setting and is the relay evaluated from to , and a new bound constraint for
apparent impedance for a fault at , which can be calculated is added:
as (see Fig. 3):
(13)
(10)
These limits depend on the regular selectivity and speed con-
straint for distance relays. With this method the minimum
The unit distance , for which accomplishes (9), deter-
is automatically calculated by the optimization routine, in order
mines point . The desired value of is found by means of
to achieve selectivity with DOCR.
a simple iteration process. In the computer program written for
this purpose, the impedance is actually calculated including the
effect of the whole power system. IV. TEST CASE
If the second zone time setting is given, constraints (7) The technique is applied to the setting of phase and ground re-
and (8) take the form (5). In other words, contributes to lays for the system shown in Fig. 4. The results are summarized
PÉREZ AND URDANETA: OPTIMAL COMPUTATION OF DISTANCE RELAYS SECOND ZONE TIMING IN A MIXED PROTECTION SCHEME 387

TABLE I
RESULTS FOR PHASE RELAYS

TABLE II
RESULTS FOR GROUND RELAYS

NOTE: CTR = current transformer ratio. TAP and INST, are the pick-up current and instantaneous current settings in secondary
Amps. NDR = no distance relay included.

in Tables I and II. The characteristics of the system shown in and MVA kV %
Fig. 4 follow: Line impedances:
and kV MVA % % km
p.u. p.u. (base 100 MVA) km
388 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 16, NO. 3, JULY 2001

Line lengths (km): the relays must be computed considering both relays. Separate
relay computation would lead to loss of selectivity.
As expected, the time setting of distance relays’ second zone
Boundary phase relays:
depends on the coordination interval used. It was shown that in
Boundary ground relays: practical cases the best setting for the second zone that assures
selectivity could be larger than the classical setting of 0.3 sec-
All CBs associated with transmission lines have phase and
onds used in distance schemes. This is verified even for very
ground DOCR and distance relays.
low coordination intervals.
The normal between DOCR is set to be 0.5 sec. and the
setting calculation was performed for different values of .
REFERENCES
From these results it can be observed that:
[1] A. J. Urdaneta, R. Nadira, and L. G. Pérez, “Optimal coordination of
a) In all cases, is over 0.3 seconds, which is the typical directional overcurrent relays in interconnected power systems,” IEEE
setting used in distance relay schemes. Trans. on Power Delivery, vol. 3, no. 3, pp. 903–911, July 1988.
b) In all cases, increases as gets larger. [2] L. G. Pérez and A. J. Urdaneta, “Optimal coordination of directional
overcurrent relays considering definite time backup relays,” IEEE Trans.
c) For this particular case, the coordination of DOCR with on Power Delivery, vol. 14, no. 4, pp. 1276–1284, Oct. 1999.
distance relays does not influence the results for the time
dial settings for s for the phase relays and
s for the ground relays. Luis G. Pérez was born in Valle de la Pascua, Venezuela, in 1957. He received
d) Observations b) and c) lead to the conclusion that for small the Electrical Engineer degree from Universidad Simón Bolívar (USB) in 1979,
the M.Sc. in E.E. from the Universidad Central de Venezuela in 1982 and the
, constraints of type (7) are more active than con- Ph.D. degree from Washington State University in 1994. He is a relay specialist
straints of type (8). This can be explained by the fact that who has been involved in many industrial and research projects in the field since
backup DOCR are more likely to reach point than 1979. He currently is a Professor of EE at USB, where he continues his work in
power system protection, high voltage substation design and system dynamics.
point .

V. CONCLUSION Alberto J. Urdaneta was born in Maracaibo, Venezuela, in 1957. He received

A method to automatically determine the optimum timing
for the second zone of distance relays in a mixed scheme with
directional overcurrent relays has been presented. It has been
shown that when the line protection schemes are composed of
distance relays and directional overcurrent relays the settings of
the Ph.D. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical engineering and applied physics from
Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, in 1986 and 1983, respec-
tively. He received the Electrical Engineer degree with honors from Universidad
Simón Bolívar in 1979. Former Dean of Professional Studies and former Head
of the Department of Energy Conversion and Delivery at USB, he presently is
a Professor of Electrical Engineering. His interests are in the areas of power
system analysis and optimization.