Evaluation of breakdown characteristics of oil-immersed transformers under non-standard lightning impulse waveforms - method for converting non-standard lightning impulse waveforms into standard lightning impulse waveforms

Abstract

To lower the insulation specifications (specifically, the lightning impulse withstand voltage) of oil-immersed transformers and thus reduce equipment cost while maintaining high insulation reliability, it is required to identify the insulation characteristics under non-standard lightning impulse waveforms that are associated with actual surge waveforms in the field and quantitatively compare them with the characteristics under the standard lightning impulse waveform. In the previous research, field overvoltages in the lightning surge time region were analyzed, and four typical non-standard lightning impulse waveforms were defined. These four waveforms were used to measure the breakdown voltages and the partial discharge inception voltages on three models of the winding insulation elements of oil-immersed transformers. The average breakdown voltages were evaluated in terms of the overvoltage duration. This paper describes a method for converting of non-standard lightning impulse waveforms into standard lightning impulse waveforms with equivalent stress for the insulation. The constructed algorithm was applied to four examples representing two types of non-standard lightning waveforms. Due to the conversion into standard lightning impulse waveforms, the crest values were reduced by 14% to 26%. This seems to be a potential for reduction of lightning impulse insulation specifications of oil-immersed transformers.