Efficient Design On The Substation Grounding Grid: A Case Study at 2x500MVA Galang

The design of the substation grounding system is very important to provide safety and protection for both the equipment and operators around it. To achieve this condition, the design must meet predetermined standards. Commonly the grounding is grid construction. On the other hand, an efficient system design is also needed. One of the determining factors is the total length conductor used. An attempt to minimize the number of lengths was carried out to improve efficiency, namely, modify grid conductor and ground rod parameters but still meet the safety criteria determined according to the IEEE-80 2000 standard. The grid grounding system generally uses copper conductors. This paper discusses the efficiency that can be expected by replacing copper conductors with other cheaper materials, namely aluminum 5005. The ground area used is rather small. The design and analysis are carried out with the SGD (Substation Grounding Grid Designer) application developed on Lab-VIEW software with a case study of 2×500 MVA Galang substations. The parameters of the grounding system considered are touch voltage, step voltage, potential grid diameter of the earth conductor, and earth ground resistance. From the observation, it was found that the modification of the substation grid grounding system can improve the average efficiency of 75.4%.