Impulse Efficiency of Ground Electrodes

The lightning current waveform has a major influence on the dynamic performance of ground electrodes. While high lightning current intensity improves the dynamic grounding performance due to ionization of the soil, very fast fronted pulses might worsen the performance in case of inductive behavior. The previous analysis has often been based on quasistatic approximation that is not applicable to very fast fronted pulses. To extend the analysis to fast fronted pulses in this paper, the full-wave analysis method based on the rigorous electromagnetic-field theory approach is used. In addition, realistic lightning current waveforms are applied, which reproduce the observed concave rising portion of typical recorded lightning current pulses. Based on the simulation results, new empirical formulas applicable for slow and very fast fronted lightning current pulses are proposed. The effects of the ionization of the soil are disregarded; therefore, the new formulas are applicable for a conservative estimate of the upper bound of the impulse impedance of ground electrodes.