Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084

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Electric Power Systems Research

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/epsr

Backflashover simulation of HV transmission lines with enhanced

counterpoise groundings
F.M. Gatta, A. Geri ∗ , S. Lauria, M. Maccioni
Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Via Eudossiana no. 18, 00184 Roma, Italy

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper deals with the backflashover phenomenon in HV overhead transmission lines (TLs) with towers
Received 5 March 2007 grounded by means of long counterpoises, typically used in high resistivity soils. Although long coun-
Received in revised form 17 April 2008 terpoises are effective in reducing the grounding impedance at power frequency, their impulse response
Accepted 25 January 2009
may affect negatively the TL backflashover rate. The study is focused on the enhancement of TL lightning
Available online 9 March 2009
performance obtainable by adding a small number of vertical grounding rods to horizontal counterpoises.
An extensive ATP-EMTP parametric analysis, based on a detailed 161 kV TL model including the leader pro-
Keywords:
gression model (LPM) of line insulations and the non-linear transient behaviour of grounding systems, has
Transmission line
Backflashover
been carried out taking into account several different values of soil resistivity as well as varying numbers,
Lightning locations and lengths of additional vertical rods. Critical lightning current ranges causing backflashover
Tower groundings have been then predicted for several lightning waveforms, of different severity. The paper shows that
Soil ionization the addition of a few vertical grounding rods significantly improves TL lightning performance by increas-
ing critical lightning current values, even if their influence is negligible at power frequency. The authors
have ascertained an increment of average critical backflashover current up to ∼55% for some typical TL
grounding system configurations and lightning waveshapes.
© 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction of non-linear ionization phenomena, occurring when large currents

Direct lightning strokes to overhead transmission line (OHL)
towers or to shield wires may cause line insulation breakdown, due
to the backflashover phenomenon [1–4]. Backflashovers account for
a large share of the faults experienced by HV and, to a lesser extent,
EHV TLs [5,6]. The prediction of backflashover is a complex task
due to the interaction of random multiparameter lightning phe-
nomena with all the components of the TL (i.e. phase and ground
conductors, insulator strings, line towers and associated grounding
systems) [7,8]. Moreover, the resulting dielectric stress is applied to
a line insulation whose behaviour should be described in statistical
terms [9]. This problem can be advantageously tackled by numer-
ical simulation using electromagnetic transient programs, usually
based on circuit approaches [10,11].
The authors proposed an ATP-EMTP [12] simulation model
to investigate the behaviour of HV (161 Kv–50 Hz) and EHV
(400 kV–50 Hz) TLs struck by lightning [13–20]. In the present
development stage, the model relies on insulation gap flashover
simulation by means of a CIGRE-LPM [1,16–20], as well as a detailed
representation of the tower grounding system [15–20]. The authors’
circuit-based grounding system model [21–30] includes the effect
∗ Corresponding author. Tel.: +39 06 44585540; fax: +39 06 4883235.
E-mail address: alberto.geri@uniroma1.it (A. Geri).
are drained to earth [31] and also allows the simulation of complex
and spatially extended grounding system configurations, as con-
firmed in [32–34]. The model has been already used to simulate
the lightning performance of existing TLs, in a wide range of soil
resistivity (g ) values (from 100 to 3000 m). Accordingly to the
wide-ranging g values, different types of grounding system have
been analysed, from relatively simple arrangements, 2 or 4 verti-
cal rods [17], to spatially extended and/or complex configurations
such as horizontal counterpoises [16] or “spider” arrangements
[19]. For concentrated groundings, a general modelling improve-
ment was dealt with in [17]; results showed an excellent agreement
between the behaviour of the proposed circuit model [15,17] and
the simple but effective CIGRE grounding ionization model [1],
merely consisting of a non-linear resistive lumped-element. For
long counterpoises [16] and “spider” grounding systems [19], the
simple CIGRE grounding ionization model is no more applicable
[1], since inductive components and mutual couplings prevail over
resistive components during fast transients.
Following impulse excitation of counterpoise grounding, the
u(t)/i(t) ratio at tower foot increases for the higher values of soil
resistivity, i.e. when longer counterpoises are typically used. In
this case the beneficial low-frequency effects of counterpoises, in
terms of tower footing impedance reduction, are offset by their
high-frequency inductive behaviour [4], and, for the higher soil
resistivities, ionization does not reverse this trend [16]. In compar-

0378-7796/$ – see front matter © 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.epsr.2009.01.008
 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084 1077

ison with counterpoises, complex “spider” geometries showed an

appreciable improvement in the overall transient performance, due
to a less markedly inductive behaviour [19].
In this paper, the authors show that the addition of a small num-
ber of vertical grounding rods, located at the tower foot, at the
end of radial branches and at the end of counterpoises, is a rela-
tively simple and inexpensive means for enhancing the lightning
performance of long counterpoises. An extensive parametric anal-
Fig. 2. Geometrical configuration of tower grounding system made of copper and
ysis of the lightning response of a HV-TL equipped with such tower buried at about 0.5 m. The complete system, consisting of radial branches, counter-
grounding systems is carried out, evaluating the effect of numbers poises and 12 vertical rods (4 located at the tower foot, 4 at the extremities of the
(4, 8 or 12) and lengths (2–10 m, in 2-m steps) of additional vertical radial branches and 4 at the ends of the counterpoises) is depicted.
rods, for several significant values of soil resistivity.
2.3. Tower grounding configuration
2. Basic considerations
Basic tower grounding configurations consist of four radial
2.1. Generality branches, prolonged with straight electrodes (see Fig. 2). The over-
all length of each arm (i.e. the counterpoises length, Lc = 13, 30,
Backflash simulations have been performed by considering the 76.5, 126 m) was chosen, for each given soil resistivity value (i.e.
161 kV–50 Hz overhead transmission line already studied in [15,17], g = 500, 1000, 2000, 3000 m), in order to obtain power frequency
and equipped with the tower grounding systems under examina- tower footing resistances, R∼, around 17  (smaller than 20–25 
tion. The latter consist of counterpoises having various lengths – generally deemed acceptable by utilities for this TLs voltage level).
function of soil resistivity – and several additional vertical rods. Tower grounding configurations have been subsequently
extended by adding 4, 8 and 12 vertical rods (i.e. Nr = 4, 8, 12),
respectively, only at the tower foot, both at the tower foot and at the
2.2. HV-TL configuration
end of each radial branch, and finally at the tower foot and at the
end of both radial branch and counterpoise. The lengths of these
Tower and insulator string configurations are depicted in Fig. 1.
additional rods have been chosen within the range 2–10 m with
The suspension tower height is typically around 30 m. The lower
steps of 2 m (i.e. Lr = 2, 6, 8, 10 m).
conductor height at the tower is 20 m; with an average span of
Tower foot resistance values at power frequency, R∼, are listed
400 m and a 12.5-m sag at mid-span, the minimum ground clear-
in Table 1, for all considered grounding system geometrical dimen-
ance of phase conductors is 7.5 m. The HV circuit is equipped with
sions, Lc , as well as for all numbers, Nr , and lengths, Lr , of additional
a 265 mm2 ACSR “Toucan” conductor per phase and two 76.9-mm2
rods.
ACSR shield wires, grounded at every tower. The length of the HV
insulator string is 1600 mm, i.e. 11 standard 146 mm pin-and-cap
insulators; the effective gap distance of the arcing horns across the 3. Developments
string is set at 1460 mm (string length minus one insulator).
3.1. HV-TL model

Phase conductors and shield wires have been simulated by

means of the well-known “Jmarti” ATP-EMTP frequency-dependent
line model [12], for the given soil resistivity (varying with the sim-
ulated grounding system), taking a 100-kHz reference frequency
for modal calculation. Corona has not been simulated. The far
ends of the simulated line stretch are connected to the line surge

Table 1
Tower footing resistances calculated at 50 Hz for all simulated grounding
configurations.

g (m) Lc (m) Nr R∼ ()

Lr (m)

0 2 4 6 8 10

500 13 0 16.72
4 15.93 15.16 14.42 13.69 13.01
8 14.39 12.66 11.35 10.32 9.49

1000 30 0 17.72
4 17.34 16.97 16.60 16.22 15.84
8 16.84 15.91 15.04 14.26 13.55
12 15.98 14.51 13.33 12.36 11.56

2000 76.5 0 17.01

4 16.89 16.77 16.64 16.52 16.38
8 16.72 16.39 16.07 15.76 15.46
12 16.34 15.70 15.90 14.54 14.03

3000 126 0 17.13

4 17.06 17.00 16.93 16.86 16.78
8 16.97 16.79 16.61 16.42 16.24
Fig. 1. Outline of simulated HV-TL: (a) tower (dimensions are in m) and (b) rigid
12 16.73 16.33 15.94 15.57 15.22
toughened glass insulator strings (dimensions are in mm).
1078 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084
Fig. 3. Model of 161 kV–50 Hz line simulated for backflash parametric analysis.
impedance matrix (calculated at 100 kHz for the relevant value
of soil resistivity). Each matrix in turn is terminated on a three-
phase 50 Hz voltage system (phase conductors) or solidly grounded
(shield wires). Shield wires are connected to relevant tower tops
at each tower (see Fig. 3). Segments and crossarms of line towers
have been simulated by means of lossless single-phase transmis-
sion lines with Z0 = 150  surge impedance and c ∼ = 3 × 108 m s−1 .
The struck tower (i.e. tower 0 in Fig. 3) is grounded via grounding
systems described in Section 2.3, while all other towers are sim-
ply grounded via a lumped-element equal to the grounding system
resistance calculated at 50 Hz (see Table 1).
With the aim of reducing computation times without com-
promising the generality of the results, which are marginally
influenced by spans’ number [17], only four line spans have been
simulated (Fig. 3).
3.2. Leader progression model
Line phase insulation is simulated by means of the CIGRE-
LPM [1], implemented in ATP-EMTP by means of the embedded
“Models” programming/simulation language [16–20]. The leader
progression model [1] is described by the following differential
equation:
dl
u(t)
 trode lateral surfaces [31] (assuming, for the soil critical field value,
= ku(t) − E0
dt dG − l
where l(t) (m) is the leader length; dG (m) is the gap length; u(t)
(kV) is the voltage across the gap.
E0 (kV/m) and k (m2 kV−2 s−1 ) are constants depending on gap
configuration and impulse polarity. The gap length dG , set as men-
tioned in Section 2.2, is 1.46 m (Fig. 1b). Numerical integration is
carried out by means of a trapezoidal algorithm.
Following bridging of the gap by the leader, backflashover is
simulated by closing a MODELS-controlled switch, with a small
ohmic resistance representing the air gap arc after flashover. No
predischarge leader current has been simulated.
3.3. Tower grounding model
Generally speaking, large lightning currents drained to earth
trigger soil ionization around grounding systems [31], both
in simple (“concentrated”) structures [35–38] and in spatially
extended/complex types [39,40] as recently reaffirmed, too
[41–49]. Non-linear ionization phenomena significantly affect the
transient response of grounding systems; therefore, the lightning
behaviour of HV-TLs and, their backflashover performance may
be accurately predicted only by taking such effects into account
[15–20].
Depending on soil resistivity and utility experience, tower
groundings of HV-TLs can consist of simple vertical rods [15,17],
long horizontal wires placed along the right of way (i.e. counter-
poises) [16] or extended and complex configurations of electrodes
(e.g. “spider” arrangements) [18–20].
The tower grounding model used by authors, based on a cir-
cuit approach, has been proposed and validated in previous papers
[21–30]. It allows to simulate simple [21,22,24–26] as well as very
complex grounding systems [23,27–30], and soil ionization. Then,
it is sufficiently reliable for the prediction of the surge impedance
of typical tower groundings, especially when the wave traveling
time is small in comparison with the rise time of the lightning
current waveshape, i.e. for most cases of practical engineering inter-
est. As the model has been validated by comparing the numerical
results both with experimental tests [21,26] and with more sophis-
ticated simulation models [27,28], the authors will limit the model
description to some relevant characteristics.
Ground electrodes are represented by a discrete number
of lumped ␲-networks (having resistive–inductive longitudinal
parameters and capacitive–conductive shunt parameters) with
resistive, inductive and capacitive mutual couplings. Soil ionization
is simulated by current-dependent shunt conductances [21–30]
governed by apparent variations of conductors’ diameter [31] under
the E ≤ Ecr condition imposed on the electrical field, E, at the elec-
(1) Ecr = 350 kV/m [26]).
An ATP-EMTP pre-processor, based on a previously developed
calculation code [15], computes all the self and mutual parameters
of the equivalent electrical ␲-networks, as well as the numer-
ical values of the non-linear function describing soil ionization
phenomena. The longitudinal parameters of the equivalent ␲-
networks are represented with mutually coupled R–L branches;
resistive and capacitive coupling, together with the lumped capac-
itances to ground are modelled with individual uncoupled R–L–C
branches [15–20]. The non-linear part of the equivalent network
has been simulated, in the simplest possible way, by representing
the individual lumped resistances to ground with TACS-controlled
resistances (at each time step the current flowing through the non-
linear resistor is measured and the corresponding resistance value
is calculated by TACS and implemented in the following step).
4. Results
The ATP models and related ATP input data files are automati-
cally generated by a dedicated pre-processing computer program,
which produces appropriate ASCII files, written according to the
ATP/EMTP input file format, starting from the physical–geometrical
characteristics of HV-TLs and grounding systems. Circuit-based
simulations aimed at checking the occurrence of backflashover con-
 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084 1079

115–144
sist in the injection of a given lightning current pulse in the tower

91–113

67–81
73–88

67–80
80–97

60–72
63–76
Ionized

94–115
79–96
76–92
top. The lightning has been simulated as a current injection by
means of the “Heidler function” waveshape current source avail-
able in ATP, at first, with time-to-crest and peak current chosen

98–119
as described in [17], for the 100 kA lightning stroke that implied

66–79
78–94

82–98

66–81
71–85

56–67
70–84

59–70
62–73
Linear

61–76
a 2.45-␮s conventional time-to-front tF , with average (S30 ) and
maximum (Sm ) di/dt equal to 40.6 and 60.7 kA/␮s, respectively.
The “base case” waveform is reasonably severe in terms of maxi-
101–123
77–93

71–84
77–92

66–78

71–85
67–80

68–80
88–106
67–81
77–92
mum steepness (for the 100 kA pulse, the uncorrelated probability
R∼

that Sm is exceeded is 6.4% [7]). However, an analysis of cumula-

10

tive probabilities shows that stiffer waveforms could be expected,

albeit more rarely, i.e. for a given peak current value the probabil-
110–138
89–109

67–81
72–87
79–96

66–79
60–73
63–76
Ionized

89–109
80–97
75–91

ity of having a steeper wave is rather high, especially for the larger
current peaks. Simulations were thus repeated with a “fast” series
of lightning waveshapes, e.g. the 100 kA pulse presents tF = 0.88 ␮s,
93–112

S30 = 114 kA/␮s and Sm = 148 kA/␮s; whose maximum steepness, for
65–78

65–79
70–84
75–90

56–67
77–93
70–84

59–70
61–73

61–73
Linear

any given current peak, has a probability of being exceeded under

2% for the entire series: these can be regarded as very severe cases.
For the sake of comparison, the “base” case waveforms have been
83–100
94–114

66–79
74–89

70–83
74–89

66–78

70–83
67–80

67–80
74–88

relaxed to obtain a “slow” series of lighting currents: for Ip = 100 kA,

R∼

we have S30 = 32 kA/␮s and Sm = 48 kA/␮s. For each applied value

8

of lightning current, simulations have been repeated with six dif-

86–106
103–128

ferent symmetrical 50 Hz three-phase voltage systems, cyclically

77–94
67–81
72–87

65–78
60–72
63–76
86–106
Ionized

79–96
74–90

assuming each HV conductor energized√ at the

√ maximum positive or
negative phase-to-ground voltage (±Un 2/ 3). In this way, repeat-
ing the simulations with the lightning current amplitude increased
86–103

68–81
72–87

65–78
68–82

56–67
59–70
64–76

61–73
Linear

60–71
74–89

in 1-kA steps, it has been possible to find a critical current range,

Critical backflashover current ranges (kA) for the simulated grounding system configurations and “base” lightning waveform (see text).

where the lower value, is the current causing backflashover only

in combination with the most unfavourable AC impressed voltage
86–105

(one out of six); the upper value is the minimum current that causes
71–85

65–78

78–93

67–79
68–82
72–86

65–78
66–79
69–82
70–84

backflash in all the six simulated strokes.

R∼
6

Simulations have been performed for the four base cases,

“counterpoise-only” tower grounding systems of Section 2.3, with
85–104
Ionized

84–103
96–119

67–81
72–87
76–92

63–75
64–77
60–72
73–88
73–89

ground resistivity g equal to 500, 1000, 2000 and 3000 m,

respectively. The extension of purely horizontal counterpoises with
vertical rods has been subsequently considered, adding 1, 2 or 4 rods
70–84
79–95

63–75

58–69
56–67
64–77
67–77
70–84

59–70
61–72
64–76
Linear

along each counterpoise; rod lengths were uniformly varied from

2 to 10 m, in 2-m steps. Only 1 or 2 rods per branch have been con-
sidered in the 500 m earth resistivity case. Taking into account
68–82
79–95

66–79

70–83

66–78
67–80

67–80
67–80

65–77
64–76

73–87

all counterpoise/rod combinations, including the no-rods case, 59

R∼

different grounding systems have been simulated.

4

Each such grounding arrangement has been implemented in

Ionized

83–102
88–109

ATP-EMTP in three different ways:

67–81
71–86

63–75
74–90
77–94
72–88

60–72
73–88

63–76

• a lumped-element linear resistor equal to the power frequency

resistance, R∼;
64–81
67–81
72–86

58–69
56–67
63–77
65–77

58–70
61–72
Linear

62–74
62–74

• a full circuit model, neglecting soil ionization;

• a full circuit model, with ionization taken into account.
64–77
65–79
71–86

63–75

66–78
66–79

65–78
66–78
68–80
67–80

65–77

The simple resistor model was included for the sake of compari-
R∼
2

son. The simple and efficient CIGRE tower footing ionization model
has not been used, because it is suited to spatially “concentrated”
Ionized

53–64
65–78

44–53
78–97

grounding systems, not to counterpoise grounding [1]. The simu-

lated grounding systems have relatively low values of R∼ despite
medium–high values of g , due to the use of long counterpoises;
50–59

42–50
57–68
Linear

64–76

this yields exceedingly large values for the CIGRE model’s threshold
ionization current Ig , generally above the critical lightning current
of the simulated system. Moreover, the “inductive” front-of-wave
63–75

65–78

65–77
62–73
Lr (m)

behaviour of counterpoise cannot be simulated.

R∼

The study involved a large number of simulations: since each

0

case had to be repeated with six different 50 Hz impressed voltages

in order to assess the critical current interval, for each lightning
0
4
8

0
4
8
12

0
4
8
12

0
4
8
12
Nr

waveform the whole range of results is the product of over 20,000

2000

3000
1000

ATP-EMTP simulations. For each of the tower grounding arrange-

500
g (m)
Table 2

ments of Fig. 2, the 50-Hz ground resistance R∼ calculated value

is reported in Table 1, while the backflashover critical currents
1080 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084

obtained with the three grounding system models listed above and

−29/+7
−39/+8

−24/+7
−26/+7
−32/+8

−22/+7
−24/+8
−28/+8

−20/+11
−20/+12
−22/+12
Ionized
the “base” waveform are reported in Table 2.
The general pattern reported in [16] is fully confirmed for the
cases without vertical rods, although values for the no-rods cases
do not exactly match those given in [16] due to slightly different

−22/+5
−31/+7

−19/+6
−21/+6
−26/+7

−20/+5
−21/+5
−22/+7

−16/+11
−18/+11
−19/+11
Linear
counterpoise geometries. Critical backflashover current intervals
were similarly calculated, for the other (“fast” and “slow”) lightning
waveforms. Results have been summarized in Table 3, which reports
−23/+6
−32/+5

−19/+5
−22/+5
−22/+6

−18/+6
−20/+6
−22/+5

−17/+8
−18/+8
−19/+8
for each grounding system configuration and model, the percent
R∼

deviation of the “fast” and “slow” average critical backflashover

10
Average critical backflashover current for different lightning waveforms (left: “fast”/right: “slow”). Results are expressed as percent deviation from the corresponding averaged values in Table 2.

currents from the corresponding average value in Table 2.

−27/+7
−37/+7

−23/+7
−26/+8
−30/+8

−22/+7
−23/+8
−27/+9

−20/+11
−21/+11
−22/+12
Ionized

5. Analysis of the results

For all the simulated waveshapes, the beneficial effect of soil

−21/+5
−29/+6

−19/+6
−21/+7
−24/+6

−19/+7
−21/+6
−22/+7

−16/+11
−19/+10
−19/+10
Linear

ionization around the tower grounding system becomes less notice-

able with increasing soil resistivity, i.e. as counterpoises get longer
in order to attain the desired value of the 50-Hz ground resistance.
−22/+6
−30/+5

−19/+6
−22/+6
−25/+5

−19/+5
−20/+6
−26/+6

−17/+8
−18/+7
−18/+8
For the higher simulated g values (2000 m or 3000 m), ioniza-
R∼

tion has little effect on critical current values yielded by the circuit
8

model, that are always lower than the optimistic values obtained
−27/+7
−33/+7

−24/+7
−26/+7
−29/+8

−22/+7
−24/+8
−26/+8

−19/+12
−21/+11
−22/+11

by representing the tower grounding system as a lumped linear

Ionized

resistor: this is most noticeable for the “fast” series of steeper wave-
forms.
The explanation is given by Fig. 4, showing the time plots of the
−19/+5
−25/+6

−18/+6
−20/+7
−23/+6

−19/+7
(20/+6
−21/+7

−16/+11
−19/+9
−18/+11

u(t)/i(t) ratio at tower foot for several of the simulated grounding

Linear

systems (full circuit model, ionization included; each figure refers

to a current slightly below the critical flashover value for the no-
−21/+6
−27/+5

−19/+6
−20/+6
−23/+6

−19/+5
−19/+5
−20/+7

−17/+8
−17/+8
−19/+7

rods case with the “base” waveform). All the no-rods curves exhibit
a pronounced initial peak, which accounts for the relatively low
R∼
6

critical currents and lightning performance: for g = 2000 m or

−26/+6
−31/+7

−22/+7
−23/+8
−28/+7

−22/+7
−24/+7
−26/+8

−19/+12
−20/+12
−21/+11

3000 m the peak attains several times the “tail” value, which in
Ionized

turn is close to the 50 Hz resistance. This is a well-known behaviour

of spatially extended grounding systems [4] due to the detrimen-
tal effect of wave propagation along the counterpoises, which
−19/+5
−22/+5

−17/+5
−19/+6
−20/+6

−19/+8
−19/+7
−19/+8

−16/+11
−17/+10
−18/+11

the authors’ model has already been shown to reproduce in [16].

Linear

Such grounding systems are actually more effective in reducing

the 50 Hz ground resistance than in containing the backflashover
−19/+5
−24/+4

−18/+5
−19/+6
−22/+6

−19/+6
−18/+6
−20/+6

−17/+8
−17/+8
−18/+7

rate.
Additional vertical rods are not very effective in reducing the
R∼
4

50 Hz tower ground resistance, especially for high values of g . On

the other hand, they change significantly the overall response to
−25/+5
−28/+7

−22/+7
−24/+7
−25/+8

−22/+7
−24/+7
−24/+8

−19/+12
−20/+12
−21/+12
Ionized

large impulse currents, especially when soil ionization is taken into

account: this is clearly shown by the calculated critical currents
in Table 2 and attendant values in Table 3. The main effect of the
−18/+4
−20/+4

−17/+6
−18/+7
−20/+3

−19/+7
(20/+6
−20/+6

−18/+11
−17/+10
−18/+10

additional vertical rods, shown in Fig. 4 for the “base” case, is the
Linear

reduction of the sharp initial “inductive” peak in the grounding sys-

tem transient response to lightning currents. This initial reduction
of the tower foot voltage is only due to the presence of additional
−19/+6
−21/+5

−17/+5
−18/+6
−19/+5

−18/+6
−19/+6
−19/+5

−17/+8
−17/+7
−17/+8

rods and is practically unaffected by ionization which begins to

R∼
2

affect the transient response only when the initial peak is ending.
This is clearly shown in Fig. 5 where insulator voltages pertaining
−26/+7

−22/+8

−18/+9

−13/+11
Ionized

to different models of the grounding system are compared.

Given the integral nature of the insulation breakdown process,
the subsequent tower foot voltage decrease due to ionization nev-
−18/+5

−17/+6

−16/+14

−13/+11

ertheless plays a beneficial role in terms of critical current increase.

Linear

Average critical lightning currents calculated from values in Table 2

are plotted in Fig. 6 as a function of rod length, for each simulated
soil resistivity value and number of additional rods. The upward
−17/+5

−17/+5

−18/+6

−17/+8
Lr (m)

shift of critical currents can be immediately appreciated. The effects

R∼
0

of the alternate lightning waveforms, i.e. “slow” and “fast”, sum-

marized in Table 3, are consistent with the base case results of
0
4
8

0
4
8
12

0
4
8
12

0
4
8
12
Nr

Table 2, confirming that additional rods are beneficial, in relative

terms, even if the performance of both bare and rod-enhanced
g (m)
Table 3

counterpoises predictably show a marked decay with the “fast”

2000

3000
1000
500

waveforms.
 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084
Fig. 4. Tower foot u(t)/i(t) ratio vs. time, of simulated grounding systems for “base” lightning waveforms (see text): (a) 500 m, 90 kA, 2.25/350 ␮s; (b) 1000 m, 75 kA,
1.95/350 ␮s; (c) 2000 m, 60 kA, 1.65/350 ␮s; (d) 3000 m, 45 kA, 1.4/350 ␮s.
Given the good “base” case performance of enhanced grounding
systems, these worsened results of the “fast” case are perhaps of
more interest than the “slow” case improvements: lightning current
waves having front times comparable to the tower roundtrip prop-
agation time tend to offset the beneficial effect of tower grounding
system because for a given current peak the maximum overvoltage
across phase insulators is essentially determined by the equiva-
lent surge impedance seen at tower top, with higher peak voltages
and lower lightning currents causing backflashover. Table 3 clearly
Fig. 5. Upper phase insulator voltage (g = 2000 m, 12 rods, 10 m long) for different
grounding system models (“base” lightning waveform, 80 kA, 2.1/350 ␮s.
1081
shows the sharp decrease in lightning withstand when very steep
current waves are involved, as well as the slight quantitative advan-
tage still enjoyed by tower equipped with enhanced grounding
systems. Strokes to mid-span cause less severe voltage stress to
line insulation: overvoltages at the tower due to strokes to shield
wires, at mid-span do not exceed those caused by strokes to tower
top [1]. Moreover, the initial response of the grounding system gets
more “spiky”, so that the relatively long-term effects of ionization
become less relevant, as shown in Fig. 7, where insulator voltages
related to the three simulated waveforms are compared, for a given
grounding system and peak current (the shifting to the right of the
“fast” waveform is only due to the inner ATP-EMTP implementation
of Heidler function).
Referring to the “base” waveforms, with g = 500 m, the use of
4 additional rods gives an average critical current up to 17% higher
than in the no-rods case; with 8 rods the critical current increase
is up to 48%, well above 100 kA. In this latter case, however, the
cost of the enhancement can be comparable to that of the original
counterpoises.
For g = 1000 m, there is little apparent convenience in adding
8 rods instead of 4, or in lengthening the rods: the maximum
increase of Icr with respect to the no-rods case is around 20%. The
12 rod case shows significant improvements in terms of lightning
performance, up to +45% with the longest rods.
When dealing with counterpoises in higher resistivity soils, i.e.
g = 2000 m or g = 3000 m, the increase of rod length is less
effective than increasing the number of rods, as shown by the nearly
flat profile of Icr as a function of rod length in Fig. 6c and d. With
g = 2000 m, despite the limited reduction of the 50-Hz (linear)
1082 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084
Fig. 6. Backflashover “average” critical lightning current for “base” lightning waveforms (see text), for various numbers of additional rods vs. rod length: (a) 500 m; (b)
1000 m; (c) 2000 m; (d) 3000 m. Square marker on current axis shows the critical current value for the no-rods case.
ground resistance due to the rods, there is a large increase of aver-
age critical currents, up to +51% with 12 rods. With g = 3000 m,
the relative decrease of 50 Hz ground resistance is even smaller,
but the increase of calculated average critical currents tops the for-
mer results in all cases, reaching +52% with 12 rods. Results do
not practically vary with the length of rods, except for the 12 rods
configuration.
For all simulated cases, the addition of a greater number of
shorter rods yields a better lightning performance, in comparison
to fewer, longer rods (as shown in Fig. 6a–d).
The same qualitative pattern is found for results obtained with
both the “slow” and “fast” waveforms.
Fig. 7. Upper phase insulator voltage (g = 3000 m, 8 rods, 6 m long) for differ-
ent lightning waveforms (Ip = 55 kA; “base” tF = 1.56 ␮s; “fast” tF = 0.7 ␮s; “slow”
tF = 2.15 ␮s).
As shown in Table 3, “slow” critical backflashover currents are
5–10% higher than in the base case, yielding a maximum increase
Icr , with respect to the bare counterpoise, around 53% (3000 m,
12 rods, 10 m long). “Fast” critical currents are markedly smaller
than those found with “base” waveforms, by 20–30% or more. How-
ever, with “fast” waveform, the bare counterpoise performance is
also impaired, so that the improvements due to additional rods
are significant, with increases of the average backflashover criti-
cal current up to 36% (again for the 3000 m, 12 rods, 10 m long
case).
From all the presented simulation results, it can be inferred that
the lightning performance of horizontal counterpoise grounding
system can be significantly enhanced by the addition of relatively
short vertical grounding rods. The maximum increase of the simu-
lated critical backflashover current goes from 36% to 53% depending
on the lightning current waveform. The benefits to be accrued
depend on the soil resistivity value: longer counterpoises, buried
in higher resistivity soils, show a significant performance improve-
ment with the addition of a small number of vertical rods. In terms
of transient response, this can be easily assessed, visually, from
Fig. 4, where the decrease of the u(t)/i(t) ratio is much more pro-
nounced in Fig. 4c and d.
The upper half of Table 4 lists (for the simulated values of soil
resistivity, and “base” lightning waveshapes) the effects of addi-
tional rods in terms of percentage increase of buried metal length,
L, decrease of power frequency resistance, R∼, and increase of
average critical backflashover current, Icr .
The lower half of Table 4 reports the effect of additional rods
amounting, for each simulated resistivity (hence, length of “bare”
counterpoise), to a 20% increase of the buried metal length. Cases
reported are: 500 m, 4 rods, 4 m long; 1000 m, 4 rods, 6 m long;
2000 m, 8 rods, 8 m long; 3000 m, 12 rods, 8 m long. The per-
 F.M. Gatta et al. / Electric Power Systems Research 79 (2009) 1076–1084 1083

Table 4 • the simulated backflashover performance of OHLs equipped with

Upper half: range of variation of buried metal length L, power frequency resistance
bare counterpoises is unacceptable due to critical backflashover
R∼ and average critical backflashover current due to additional rods (with respect
to counterpoise-only grounding). Lower half: R∼ and Icr resulting from a L lightning currents Icr as low as 40–50 kA, despite good values of
around 20%. 50 Hz ground resistance;
• additional vertical rods significantly improve lightning perfor-
Increments %
mance of the simulated OHLs, by reducing the characteristic
g (m) inductive “spike” in the initial lightning response of long counter-
500 1000 2000 3000 poises; maximum calculated increases of Icr are between ∼53% for
L +(15–154) +(7–100) +(3–39) +(2–24) “slow” waveforms and ∼36% for very steep lightning waveforms
R∼ −(5–43) −(2–35) −(1–18) −(<1–11) (despite a marked decrease of all critical currents in the latter
Icr +(6–8%) +(12–46) +(26–51) +(36–52) case);
L ∼
=+20 ∼
=+20 ∼
=+20 ∼
=+20
• for the higher simulated soil resistivities, the relative increase
R∼ −4.3 −5.9 −7.0 −7.7 of Icr caused by additional vertical rods becomes more relevant
Icr +5.7 +14.7 +35.9 +49.5 despite their negligible effect on the 50 Hz ground resistance, due
to the poor lightning performance of “bare” counterpoises.

The addition of a limited number of vertical grounding rods can

thus be regarded as an effective (and relatively inexpensive) means
to improve the backflashover performance of OHLs equipped with
long counterpoises.

References

Fig. 8. Lower phase insulator voltage for two grounding systems: no-rods and 4 rods
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6. Conclusions
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Fabio Massimo Gatta was born in Alatri (Italy) in 1956. He received a doctor degree
in Electrical Engineering from University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1981. He joined
the Department of Electrical Engineering of University of Rome “La Sapienza” as
a researcher and, starting from 1998, he is associate professor in Electrical Power
Systems at the same University. His main research interests are in power system
analysis, long distance transmission, transient stability, temporary and transient
overvoltages, and series, shunt compensation, SSR, distributed generation, power
plants.
Alberto Geri was born in Terni (Italy) in 1961. He received a doctor degree in Electrical
Engineering from University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1987. He joined the Depart-
ment of Electrical Engineering of University of Rome “La Sapienza” as a researcher
in 1989. Starting from 2000, he is associate professor in Electrical Engineering at
the same University. He began research activity in 1982 and his main interests are
in MHD energy conversion, low-frequency electric and magnetic field computation,
electromagnetic transient, lightning and grounding systems.
Stefano Lauria was born in Rome, Italy, in 1969. He received the doctor degree and the
Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 1996 and
in 2001, respectively. In 2000 he joined the Department of Electrical Engineering of
University of Rome “La Sapienza” as a researcher. His main research interests are in
power systems analysis, distributed generation, power quality and electromagnetic
transients. He is a member of IEEE Power Engineering Society and of AEI (Italian
Electrical Association).
Marco Maccioni was born in Anagni, Italy, in 1978. He received the doctor degree in
electrical engineering from the University of Rome “La Sapienza” in 2005. Actually he
is an external collaborator of the Department of Electrical Engineering of University
of Rome “La Sapienza”. His main research interest is in power systems analysis.