Zones of Protection

Relays have inputs from several current trans­formers (CTs) and the zone of protection is bound­ed by these CTs. While the CTs provide the ability to detect a fault inside the zone, circuit breakers (CBs) provide the ability to isolate the fault by disconnect­ing all of the power equipment within the zone. Thus, a zone boundary is usually defined by a CT and a CB. When the CT is part of the CB it becomes a natural zone boundary. When the CT is not an inte­gral part of the CB, special attention must be paid to the fault detection and fault interruption logic. The CT still defines the zone of protection, but commu­nication channels must be used to implement the tripping function. Figure 1 shows the zones of pro­tection in a typical system.

Relay Speed

It is, of course, desirable to remove a fault from the power system as quickly as possible. However, the relay must make its decision based upon voltage and current waveforms which are severely distorted due to transient phenomena which follow the occurrence of a fault. The relay must separate the meaningful and significant information contained in these waveforms upon which a secure relaying decision must be based. These considerations demand that the relay take a certain amount of time to arrive at a decision with the necessary degree of certainty. The relationship between the relay response time and its degree of certainty is an inverse one and is one of the most basic properties of all protection systems.

Although the operating time of relays often varies between wide limits, relays are generally classified by their speed of operation as follows:

Instantaneous—These relays operate as soon as a secure decision is made. No intentional time delay is introduced to slow down the relay response.

Time-delay—An intentional time delay is inserted between the relay decision time and the initia­tion of the trip action.

High-speed—A relay that operates in less than a specified time. The specified time in present practice is 50 milliseconds (3 cycles on a 60 Hz system)

Ultra high-speed—This term is not included in the present relay standards but is commonly consid­ered to be operation in 4 milliseconds or less.

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