Improved Adaptive Protection Scheme Based Combined Centralized/Decentralized Communications for Power Systems Equipped With Distributed Generation

Recently, numerical relays with communication capabilities have been employed to provide adaptive solutions for Distributed Generations (DGs) protection issues. This paper presents an adaptive protection scheme based on centralized and decentralized communication to address DG protection problems. The proposed method uses two directional relays in each feeder, one at the beginning (called forward relay) and one at the end (called reverse relay). These relays can communicate with each other and the central unit. The centralized communication occurs between the central unit and the relays in the system when any relay’s status changes from connected to disconnected or vice versa. It aims to define the operation mode, islanding detection, and activate the relays settings to achieve proper coordination. Protective relays are coordinated using a Genetic Algorithm (GA) to optimize protection time. The optimization problem considers pick up current (Ipu), Time Multiplier Setting (TMS), Plug Setting Multiplier (PSM), and curve type. Decentralized communication, which occurs when any relay detects a fault, increases relays’ accuracy and speed of decision-making. This paper also proposes a novel method for detecting High Impedance Faults (HIF), a significant difficulty for protecting engineers as it draws a very low current that conventional overcurrent relays fail to detect in most cases. HIF is detected using wavelet transform, symlet 8, detail 2 (d2), and relay communication. On the IEC benchmark microgrid, the suggested algorithm is tested. ETAP is used for load flow analysis and short circuit analysis, whereas MATLAB is used for GA optimization, HIF modelling, and wavelet transform routines.