A new algorithm for fault location on transmission lines by optimal PMU placement

In this paper, the problem of placing a minimum number of phasor measurement units (PMUs) in a transmission system is considered so that faults on all lines of the network can be diagnosed and located irrespective of their locations. For this purpose, a PMU placement algorithm is applied to calculate the required data for impedance-based fault location of any fault line in the network, achieving the full potential of the circuit laws throughout the system. Another algorithm is then proposed to compute the voltage and current values of the fault line for fault-location purposes. Moreover, as many networks are already equipped with PMUs, the proposed algorithm makes it possible to locate faults on more lines of such networks compared to previous methods. The proposed algorithm for PMU placement is examined for 14, 30, 39 and 118 bus IEEE test systems. Additionally, fault location by synchronized voltage and current measurements, which can be remote from the faulted line, is performed on the 118-bus IEEE test system. Copyright (c) 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.