On-line partial discharge monitoring in medium voltage underground cables

For many years incipient partial discharge (PD) faults in power cables have been identified through off-line investigation techniques. More recently, in an effort to allow pro-active asset management of the medium-voltage (MV) cable network to be carried out, continuous on-line monitoring systems are being installed with the aim of reducing unexpected failures. This study presents work on the analysis and handling of acquired data, from the point of view of asset management and the PD activities observed in an on-line cable monitoring systems. Initially, a review of on-line against off-line cable PD monitoring is presented, in terms of their setups and their respective advantages and disadvantages. The study then presents the authorspsila experience of applying wavelet-based denoising techniques [both the discrete wavelet transform (DWT) and the second generation wavelet transform (SGWT)] to PD data denoising. Results of a study on the on-line PD-based monitoring of MV underground cables that are presented in the following section demonstrate that PD activity which is observed in on-line monitoring also has an associated high level of electrical noise that must be removed to allow proper identification of the PD signals and the denoised PD activity is seen to vary with time. Finally, the necessity of developing a means by which knowledge rules can automatically be acquired from on-line condition monitoring data, to reduce reliance on human expertise, is discussed.