Virtual instrumentation for Partial Discharge monitoring

This paper describes a virtual instrumentation architecture to measure and monitor partial discharges (PD) in high voltage equipment. The system has been successfully applied in the diagnosis of several rotating machines in Brazil. The proposed solution for PD measurement using virtual instrumentation involved defining architecture for the measurement system, the specification of suitable hardware modules and the development of signal processing algorithms and control software for the measurement of PD in the high frequency (HF) band - up to 30 MHz. It is scalable with a flexible number of channels, and can be easily adapted to different needs of each monitoring scenario. Comparisons with measurements performed using other commercial PD measurement systems and the main results obtained so far are presented, including the experience of Eletronorte Company in using this system to do diagnose hydro generators in 4 power plants, totaling 9 GW of hydroelectric generation.