Partial Discharge Characterization Through Innovative Continuous Monitoring of Medium Voltage Substation

Partial discharges (PDs) are one of the key factors accelerating medium voltage (MV) equipment ageing. PDs can hence be used as an aging signature of MV switchgears. In a previous work [1], an innovative compact digital solution for PD continuous monitoring, based on capacitive coupling technology was presented. In this work, two main constraints of this monitoring device were assessed: having nonstandard IEC bandwidth and limited dataset. The application of this compact PD monitoring device has been then tested on multiple typical faults leading to PD in MV switchgears through experimental simulations in laboratory. A confirmation with state-of-the-art IEC compliant PD detector for Lab has been also performed. Results showed that the PD continuous monitoring system with nonstandard bandwidth and simplified data set is adapted to differentiate multiple types of PD sources in MV switchgears.