GE’s GridNode High-Speed Falling Conductor Protection provides a reliable solution to detect and isolate broken overhead line conductors using secure wide-area measurements.

When an overhead power line breaks, the energized conductor falls to the ground or surrounding objects causing a high-impedance fault and/or arcing. For over 20 years, the industry has relied on negative-sequence current (I2/I1) principles to detect a broken conductor. However, with the increasing penetration of Distributed Energy Resources(DERs) and depending on the number of loads and/or presence of single-phase loads connected to a line, this solution is no longer an efficient method of protection.

GE’s GridNode High-Speed Falling Conductor Protection offers an evolution to falling conductor monitoring and protection by delivering enhanced reliability, speed, and performance needed for today’s distribution networks.

To learn more about GE’s GridNode High-Speed Falling Conductor Protection (HFCP), read our 2-part interview series as we answer important questions about the risks of broken conductors and the advantages of HFCP. We also explore HFCP system architecture and study the testing phases of this solution.

Key Benefits

• Reliably identify broken overhead lines and trip corresponding breakers or block a recloser under 500ms prior to the conductor touching the ground
• Easy deployment with no coordination required with existing protection settings
• Minimize customer impact with coordinated operation to isolate the broken line
• Increased flexibility through the ability to accommodate high DER penetration
• Prolong asset life by preventing potential damage caused by unnecessary reclosing
• Increased reliability with the capability to detect broken conductors in low load branches as well as feeder end
• Enhanced reliability through real-time adaptive settings
• Low implementation costs by leveraging existing digital protective relays