A Proposal of an Estimation Method for Identifying Return Strokes Causing Surge Arrester Burnout Faults on Actual Distribution Line

Analysis of actual outages is essential for the efficient lightning protection design. We estimate the strokes that cause the surge arrester burnout faults using two ways. One method only considers the distance from the fault position to the estimated stroke position by the lightning location system, and another method also considers the estimated peak current. There is variation in the configuration of the distribution line experiencing surge arrester damage: various types of surge arresters are installed at the lightning striking pole and adjacent poles, and the low voltage power distribution line is sometimes installed below the medium-voltage line. The influence of the variation on the possibility of the surge arrester damage is studied by numerical calculation. The strokes estimated by the method that considers both the distance and the peak current agree with the results of the numerical calculation with a high rate.