Design of DC-Voltage Arc Fault Detection Equipment In Solar Power Generating System

Abstract

According to the Indonesian information portal (Indonesia.go.id). The Indonesian government is committed to developing new and renewable energy-based energy (EBT), following the national energy policy blueprint, which states that the schedule and percentage must be achieved by 2025, the role of new and renewable energy can be achieved reach 25% by 2025. That position will increase to 36% by 2050. The government is also accelerating the development of EBT, and to meet this target, the government has also issued several policies. These policies include ESDM No. 50/2017 concerning Utilization of Renewable Energy Sources for the Provision of Electricity, Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources Regulation Number 49 of 2018 concerning the Use of Rooftop Solar Power Generation Systems by Consumers of PT. The State Electricity Company /PLN (Persero), and the Decree of the Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources No. 39 K/20/MEM/2019 concerning Ratification of PLN RUPTL 2019–2028. The government's encouragement and policy to use new and renewable energy will significantly increase electricity consumption and the use of new and renewable energy, namely solar power plants. With the increasing use of solar power plants, there will also be an increase in problems or disturbances that will be caused, one of which is arc faults. One of the problems caused by arc faults is that it triggers a spark/arc and eventually causes a fire disaster. According to the National Disaster Management Agency/BNBP, for the 2010–2019 period, there were 1,173 fire cases. These cases mainly occurred in residential areas, traditional market areas, small-scale factories, and others. The phenomenon of arc fault occurs or arises due to the failure of the insulation of the conducting cable, which causes the cable insulation to burn out. This has the potential to cause a fire. Insulation failure is also caused by the age of the conductor, improper installation, extreme environments, and pressure. Arc fault at DC voltage is a disturbance with a relatively high impedance with a fault current more significant than the nominal current. In terms of the speed of the arc fault, it is swift, with a disturbance speed of 0.5 cycles of about 0.01 seconds. Therefore, conventional equipment such as MCB will not detect the interference. Thus, we propose arc fault detection equipment in the solar power plant network in this study. This study aims to early mitigate the emergence of arc faults in the PLTS network system in order to reduce the incidence of fires due to arc fault disturbances.