Fault location in distribution networks base on the use of wavelet packet analysis

This paper presents a fault location procedure for distribution networks, based on the use of wavelet packet analysis of the voltage transients associated with the fault-originated traveling waves. The proposed method just needs the measured voltage transients recorded at the observation point without the need of multi-recording nodes and relevant synchronization. Fault-originated traveling waves propagate along the network and will be reflected back and forth between the observation point as mentioned above and the discontinuity points. Therefore, the traveling waves recorded at the observation point contain some characteristic frequencies associated with specific paths in which the fault-originated traveling waves propagate. The fault point can be located while the characteristic frequencies are identified. The effectiveness of the method has been verified by the simulation results in a typical distribution network.