Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering

ECE 765
Power System Protection and Relaying
Fall 2020
W 10:00 AM - 11:20 AM & F 14:30 PM - 15:50 PM

Details of this course syllabus are subject to change throughout the term.

Instructor Information
Instructor: Sahar Azad, Ph.D., PEng
Office: EIT 4017
Office Phone: 519-888-4567, ext. 33974
Email: [email protected]

Note: When sending an email to the course instructor:

1. Ensure that the email’s subject contains ECE 765.

2. The email is sent from a University of Waterloo mail server with your official UWid. Email from
Gmail and the like will not be received.

Prerequisites: ECE 360, ECE464 or equivalent and general knowledge of fault analysis.

Course website
The course website is on LEARN and it contains all lecture materials, assignments/solutions, and it will
be used as the primary medium for communication.

Course Description
This course focuses on the protection of various component of a power system including transmission
lines, rotating machinery, transformers, busbars, reactors, capacitors and distribution lines. The course
will review the fundamental features of a reliable protection system and will discuss the major
components of a protection system including current and voltage transformers, circuit breakers, and
relays. Various protection strategies such as overcurrent protection, distance protection, pilot protection
and differential protection will be discussed in this course.

1
Course Goals and Learning Outcomes
Upon completion of this course, students should be able to:
A. Provide an in-depth understanding of power system protection requirements;
B. Describe the operational principle of the main components of a protection system;
C. Describe the fundamental principle of various protection methods for the main power system
components including transmission and distribution networks, rotating machinery including
generators and motors, transformers, and busbars;
D. Explain the advantages and disadvantages of various protection methods for each power system
component and specify the proper protection method for the component in any given power
system.

Course Content
• Module 1-Protection system requirements (1 lecture): Overview of power system structure,
causes and types of faults, and protection system main requirements
• Module 2-Elements of protection systems (2 lectures): Relay types and operating principles,
circuit breaker types and operating principles (optional), and instrument transformers types and
operating principles
• Module 3-Review of symmetrical components and power system fault calculations (1 lecture):
Balanced 3-phase faults, Unbalanced faults, Symmetrical components, and Sequence network
construction
• Module 4-Overcurrent protection (2 lectures): Principles of overcurrent protection, fuses,
sectionalizers and reclosers, time-delay overcurrent relays, and instantaneous overcurrent relays
• Module 5-Coordination principle of overcurrent protection devices (2 lectures): Guidelines for
coordination of overcurrent protection devices
• Module 6-Directional overcurrent relays (2 lectures): Application of directional relays, and
different connections and maximum torque angles
• Module 7-Distance protection (2 lectures): Distance relay characteristics, and factors affecting
distance relay performance
• Module 8-Pilot protection of transmission lines (4 lectures): Communication channels,
directional comparison blocking, directional comparison unblocking, direct underreaching
transfer trip, permissive overreaching transfer trip, permissive underreaching transfer trip, and
current-based pilot schemes
• Module 9-Transformer protection (2 lectures): Overcurrent protection, differential protection,
and nonelectrical protection
• Module 10-Busbar Protection (2 lectures): Common busbar arrangements and busbar protection
• Module 11-Generator protection (2 lectures): Typical power plant layouts, grounding methods
for generators and protection principle against stator faults, rotor faults, unbalanced currents,
overexcitation, overspeed, abnormal voltages and frequencies, and loss of excitation
• Module 12-Motor protection (2 lectures): Motor failures, thermal protection, stall or locked rotor
protection, short circuit protection, ground fault protection, load-loss/load jam protection,
overspeed protection, unbalance current protection, undervoltage protection, and overvoltage
protection
Note: The number of lectures for each module may vary based on class progress.

2
Text and References (Recommended)
• Stanely H. Horowitz, & Arun G. Phadke, Power System Relaying, 4th edition, Wiley (Text-1)
• J.L. Blackburn, Protective Relaying: Principles and Applications, Taylor & Francis Ltd. (Text-2)
• J. Duncan Glover, Mulukutla S. Sarma & Thomas, J. Overbye, Power System Analysis and Design,
5th edition, CENGAGE Learning (Text-3)

Course Schedule
• Lectures will be on Wednesdays (10:00 AM - 11:20 AM) and Fridays (14:30 PM - 15:50 PM)
starting September 9th and ending December 7th.
• Reading Week: October 10 through 18 (no lectures or deadlines)
• Study day: December 8th (no academic activities or deadlines)

Course Requirements and Assessment

The course grade will be based on six assignments and a final examination, which will be held
during the official examination schedule. The breakdown is as follows:

Assessment Content Date of Evaluation Weighting

Final Exam (Oral) M1-M12 Date and time TBD 20%
Final Exam (Written) M1-M12 Date and time TBD 30%
Assignment I M1 & M2 Date and time TBD 5%
Assignment II M3 Date and time TBD 10%
Assignment III M4, M5 & M6 Date and time TBD 10%
Assignment IV M7 Date and time TBD 10%
Assignment V M8 Date and time TBD 10%
Assignment VI M9 & M10 Date and time TBD 10%
Total 105%
The instructor reserves the right to use alternative grading schemes in special circumstances. For
example, if an accommodation is necessary, an alternative grading scheme may be used to the benefit of
the individual student

LECTURES

• The lectures will be uploaded on LEARN on Wednesdays at 10 am and Fridays at 14:30 pm. The
content that will be uploaded on each day will not be longer than a regular class duration (80
minutes).
• The presentation slides will be uploaded on LEARN before the lectures are uploaded.
• The annotated slides will be uploaded on LEARN after each module is finished.
• There will be a 50 minutes weekly live session (starting from the third week of September) via
virtual classrooms by Bongo, where the students can ask their questions from the instructor. In
these sessions, the questions that the students have already sent to the instructor from the last
module will be answered. The students may ask for specific parts of the slides to be explained
again. If time allows, other questions will be answered. If no questions are sent in advance, the
corresponding live session will be cancelled.

3
 • The live sessions will be recorded, and students will have access to the recordings after the
sessions.
• The live sessions will be scheduled after consulting with the students. One option is Fridays from
14:30 pm to 15:20 pm.

ASSIGNMENTS

• Six assignments are to be given. The assignments will be posted on LEARN after the corresponding
modules are covered in class.
• The assignments are due in a week after being posted.
• All assignments should be neat and clear. Messy and crumpled assignments will not be marked.
• Late assignments will not be accepted unless a legitimate reason (illness, religious conviction, etc.)
is discussed with the instructor prior to the assignment due date.
• Solutions to the assignments will be posted on LEARN after the due date of the assignments.

FINAL EXAM

• The final exam will be held during the official exam period December 9-23, 2020.
• The online final exam has two components: an oral exam and a written exam.
• The written final exam will be administered by LEARN and will be split into various segments
including a combination of multiple-choice, true/false, short answer and multi-part calculation
questions. An exam instruction manual will be uploaded before the exam on LEARN to familiarize
the students with the exam procedure.
• The oral final exam is closed book.
• The written final exam will be open book in the sense that you may consult your textbook, course
notes, and materials posted in the course LEARN site. Use of any other resource (including file-
sharing services such as chegg.com, coursehero.com, stackexchange.com, ...) is prohibited. You
may not communicate directly or indirectly with any person except the course instructor.
• The exam questions will be selected from a pool of questions.
• A student missing the final exam will automatically receive a score of zero for that exam.
• The written final exam is synchronized and will be scheduled in 24-hour windows, but multiple
start times may be provided to accommodate students in different time zones and to give
students more flexibility in dealing with multiple exams scheduled on the same day. The multiple
start time option will be available only if the students are in different time zones or they have
multiple exams in one day.
• The instructor reserves the right to curve any of the assignment grades, and the final marks.

Information on Plagiarism Detection

Turnitin.com: Text matching software (Turnitin®) may be used to screen lab reports and assignments in
this course. Turnitin® is used to verify that all materials and sources in assignments are documented.
Students’ submissions are stored on a U.S. server, therefore students must be given an alternative (e.g.,
scaffolded assignment or annotated bibliography), if they are concerned about their privacy and/or

4
security. Students will be given due notice, in the first week of the term and/or at the time assignment
details are provided, about arrangements and alternatives for the use of Turnitin® in this course.
It is the responsibility of the student to notify the instructor if they, in the first week of term or at the
time assignment details are provided, wish to submit the alternate assignment.

Academic Integrity

Academic Integrity: In order to maintain a culture of academic integrity, members of the University of
Waterloo are expected to promote honesty, trust, fairness, respect and responsibility.

Discipline: A student is expected to know what constitutes academic integrity, to avoid committing
academic offences, and to take responsibility for his/her actions. A student who is unsure whether an
action constitutes an offence, or who needs help in learning how to avoid offences (e.g., plagiarism,
cheating) or about “rules” for group work/collaboration should seek guidance from the course
professor, academic advisor, or the Undergraduate Associate Dean. When misconduct has been found
to have occurred, disciplinary penalties will be imposed under Policy 71 – Student Discipline. For
information on categories of offenses and types of penalties, students should refer to Policy 71 - Student
Discipline.

Grievance: A student who believes that a decision affecting some aspect of his/her university life has
been unfair or unreasonable may have grounds for initiating a grievance. Read Policy 70 - Student
Petitions and Grievances, Section 4.

Appeals: A student may appeal the finding and/or penalty in a decision made under Policy 70 - Student
Petitions and Grievances (other than regarding a petition) or Policy 71 - Student Discipline if a ground for
an appeal can be established. Read Policy 72 - Student Appeals.

Other sources of information for students

Academic integrity (Arts) Academic Integrity Office (uWaterloo)

Accommodation for Students with Disabilities

Note for students with disabilities: The AccessAbility Services office, located in Needles Hall Room
1132, collaborates with all academic departments to arrange appropriate accommodations for students
with disabilities without compromising the academic integrity of the curriculum. If you require academic
accommodations to lessen the impact of your disability, please register with the AS office at the
beginning of each academic term.