Dianoush Emami is a longtime California electrical engineer who works in areas such as electrical distribution and high voltage transmission at power plants. Among Dianoush Emami’s accomplishments has been the ground-up design and modification of substation facilities in the five to 35-kV range. His tasks ranged from transformer specifications to the design of grounding elements.
Adequate grounding is essential for any type of power substation, as this ensures that excess energy generated dissipates and no one is in danger of receiving a shock from over voltage. It stabilizes circuit potential to a safe level; grounding also provides a low impedance pathway to fault currents, which allows protective devices to operate reliably when a ground fault occurs.
Such systems within the generating station take the form of grounded metallic enclosures that surround electrical equipment and any conductive materials that are exposed (though not carrying conductive materials themselves). The danger is that these materials can become energized should the insulation fail or a person make accidental contact with the conductor. Ensuring that these elements are grounded helps ensure safe, stable system function.
Another important facet of grounding within a generating station is that it should offer a ground fault current return path. This allows ground faults to be detected by protective devices and isolated when emergencies occur until the situation is remediated.
