Rahman Dashti

The line parameters of the distribution network (DN) may change because of atmospheric, structural, and operational conditions. The changes of the line parameters and their uncertainty compromise the accuracy of automatic fault location, which is important for distribution grid operators (DSOs). This paper presents a new time-domain fault location (TDFL) method to locate faults in smart power DN under the line parameters uncertainty. Besides, a time-domain distributed model of line parameters is used to enhance parameter estimation accuracy and FL. In the suggested method, line parameters' accurate values are determined using a mixed gradient descent particle swarm optimization (GD-PSO) algorithm. The effects of parameter uncertainty, DGs operation conditions and modes, different types of arc faults, various fault distances, resistances, and the fault inception angles are studied. For further evaluation of the proposed method's robustness, two practical tests in the laboratory are carried out.