Wavelet Kernel based Convolutional Neural Network for Localization of Partial Discharge Sources within a Power Apparatus

This article presents a new convolutional neural network (CNN) topology using wavelet kernels to detect and discriminate single or multiple partial discharge (PD) locations in high voltage power apparatus with increased accuracy. The method is tested on an electrical equipment model with acoustic PD sensors. A cubical tank has been emulated in the laboratory representing the equipment under test and partial discharge sources have been placed at different positions along with the required data acquisition hardware. The present scheme eliminates the requirement of separate algorithms for feature extraction and classification of the acquired PD signals. Wavelet kernels of the CNN play a crucial role in feature learning, and the proposed CNN architecture as a whole, can classify the features in a supervised manner. The performance of the proposed scheme is compared with other existing methods using the same data set. It is found that an overall accuracy of 97.64% is achieved by the proposed method, outperforming other existing methods by a significant margin of at least 5% in terms of accuracy. The developed module is a generic one and can be adapted for different high voltage electrical apparatus with similar topological structures; hence, it can be used in various ways in power industry.