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EMPIR project continues dissemination activities, including the revision of the IEC 60060-1 and IEC 60060-2 standards

High voltage alternating current (AC) or direct current (DC) grids are being introduced due to their increased energy efficiency. However, the reliability of grid components must be guaranteed to ensure the robustness of high voltage power grids, especially with the increasing use of renewable energy sources that are more unpredictable than their conventional counterparts.

Completed EMPIR project Support for standardisation of high voltage testing with composite and combined wave shapes (19NRM07, HV-com²) focused on the pre-normative research needed to determine the reliability of grid components. This included the standardisation of high voltage grid component testing with composite and combined wave shapes, which prior to this project suffered from inadequate traceability and thus led to incorrect results. In 2022, the project consortium initiated three  measurement campaigns  to publicise their dissemination activities.

The first comparison was carried out at PTB with different composite and combined voltage divider combinations. The measured test voltage differences were less than 2 % and are meeting the project target uncertainty. To assess the effects of composite voltages on linearity and measurement uncertainty of high voltage measurement systems based on universal dividers, a comparison campaign was carried out at Graz University of Technology in September 2022 and at Technische Universität Dresden in November 2022. During this campaign, the measurement results of commercially available measurement systems from different manufacturers were compared with the reference measurement system designed in HV-com² project.

All systems retained their high overall accuracy during all superimposed voltage tests. The obtained results will be used to investigate how universal voltage dividers intended for the measurement of superimposed voltages can be calibrated and how this process can be standardized.

Since then, the project partners have published the following papers:

• Universal Measuring Unit for High Voltage Measurements
• Development and testing of software for evaluation of high voltage composite and combined waveforms
• Testing and analysis of universal high voltage divider
• Design and Verification of a Calculable Composite Voltage Calibrator
• Evaluation of composite voltage test parameters
• Contribution to the standardisation of measurement of composite and combined high voltages
• Metrological infrastructure for the measurement of superimposed impulse voltages in HVDC systems
• The Usage of High Voltage Amplifiers to Setup Reference Calibrators for Combined and Impulse Voltages up to 1 kV
• Realization of the reference composite voltage waveforms for lightning impulse (LI) voltages superimposed over DC and AC signals
• Design of a modular wideband high voltage reference divider

At the 23rd International Symposium on High Voltage Engineering the following seven papers were published by the project partners:

• Measuring HVDC-impulse composite voltages with high-voltage dividers: Laboratory comparison and deviation analysis
• New reference HVDC divider for the calibration of testing equipment up to 1600 kV
• Importance of impulse calibrator output impedance and method of all waveform compensation
• High voltage SiC based calculable impulse voltage calibrator
• Performance of universal voltage dividers for measurement of superimposed voltages
• A Modular Universal Divider for Calibration of UHVDC, and Composite Waves up to 1400 kV
• Reference Measurement System for Traceability of Composite and Combined Waves

Other dissemination activities include:

• At the Conference on Precision Electromagnetic Measurements 2022, VTT submitted and presented their paper ‘Design of a modular wideband high voltage reference divider’.
• In April 2023 HV-com² collaborated with Metrology for future energy transmission (19ENG02, FutureEnergy) to host a three-day workshop discussing the achievements of both projects. More than 50 participants joined the workshop at PTB, Germany’s National Metrology Institute.
• The project’s results formed the basis for the standards IEC 60060-1 ED4: High-voltage test techniques - Part 1: General definitions and test requirements and IEC 60060-2 ED4: High-voltage test techniques - Part 2: Measuring systems.

The project coordinator Johann Meisner (PTB) comments on the successful dissemination of the project results:

“The performed investigations conclusively demonstrated that commercially available measurement systems based on universal voltage dividers are capable of analysing the applied DC+LI/SI superimposed voltages with the accuracy required for high voltage testing. Moreover, it is suggested that calibration of measurement systems based on universal voltage dividers for use with composite voltages can be done with individual voltages as long as the individual scale factors for DC, AC and impulse are within 3%. As a result of the work performed new and extended internationally Measurement Capabilities now exist at European NMIs. These include measurement of combined and composite waveshapes at high voltages.

As such, the project is a good example how EURAMET’s electrical metrology community supports innovation and improves the quality assurance infrastructure in the high voltage grid for a sustainable energy supply for all of us.”

This EMPIR project is co-funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme and the EMPIR Participating States.

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