AUTHOR=Liang Dong , Zhang Kaiwen , Ge Song , Wang Yang , Wang Deyi 

TITLE=A novel fault monitoring method based on impedance estimation of power line communication equipment

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Energy Research

VOLUME=Volume 11 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/energy-research/articles/10.3389/fenrg.2023.1103298

DOI=10.3389/fenrg.2023.1103298

ISSN=2296-598X

ABSTRACT=An obvious shortcoming of using power line communication (PLC) devices for real-time monitoring and location of grid ground faults is the lack of real-time high-frequency impedance information since faults are closely related to impedance information. This study proposes a new method for real-time monitoring and locating grid ground faults by estimating the high-frequency input impedance using the channel frequency  response (CFR) at the PLC receiver, without the need for additional hardware devices. Firstly, based on multi-conductor transmission line theory, the power line channel and ground fault are jointly modeled; in the power line channel, according to the linkage between CFR and impedance spectrum, the key factors affecting impedance are obtained by feature extraction of CFR using variational mode decomposition (VMD). Then,impedance estimation results are obtained by inversion analysis, and finally follows and identifies the abnormal state of the power line using the impedance variation and the decision tree machine learning algorithm model. The computer simulation results prove that the method has accurate monitoring and detection locating effect for both high and low impedance cable faults.