532
2, MAY 2005
Development of Power System Protection Laboratory
Through Senior Design Projects
Bhuvanesh A. Oza and Sukumar M. Brahma, Member, IEEE
Abstract—This paper describes a novel power system labora-
tory at Birla Vishvakarma Mahavidyalaya (B.V.M.) Engineering
College, Gujarat, India, where every experiment was designed,
wired and commissioned through senior design projects. The
experiments on power system protection are especially unique in
terms of their design and implementation and will be highlighted
in this paper. They provide a real substation-like operating en-
vironment. Through these projects, the students, in addition to
getting familiar with the fundamentals of protection, learned how
different protection schemes are wired and how they operate in
a real power system. For the institute, a quality laboratory was
established at a low cost, which is a crucial issue for most colleges
in many parts of the world.
Index Terms—Circuit breaker, fault, power distribution system,
power engineering education, power system protection, protective
device coordination, relay.
I. INTRODUCTION
O VER the past two decades, different laboratories focusing
on teaching and researching the area of power system pro-
tection have been reported [1]–[8]. Sidhu and Sachdev [1], [2]
describe a laboratory at the University of Saskatchewan that fo-
cuses on designing relay strategies, modeling them and testing
them using high speed digital signal processing (DSP) boards
and an array of design softwares. Redfern et al. [3] describe
testing relays using actual voltage and current data converted
from the data files generated by power system simulation soft-
ware. Lee et al. [4] report a relay performance testing facility
using simulated transmission line modules. The paper describes
both the hardware and the software strategy and documents the
performance results of an instantaneous overcurrent relay and a
reverse power relay. Carullo and Nwankpa [5] describe a labo-
ratory that focuses on the data acquisition, energy management
and supervisory control aspects of a power system that form
the basis of a modern protection system. Kabir [6] documents
the performance of a laboratory experiment on a scaled down
power system protected by a single computer implementing an
over-current protection strategy. Chen et al. [7] report the lab-
oratory implementation of an intelligent embedded micropro-
cessor based overcurrent protection scheme. McLaren et al. [8]
report a relay testing facility based on Real Time Digital Simu-
lator (RTDS).
Manuscript received February 18, 2004; revised May 28, 2004. This work
was supported by a grant from the All India Council for Technical Education
(AICTE). Paper no. TPWRS-00087-2004.
B. A. Oza is with the Electrical Engineering Department, B.V.M. Engi-
neering College, Vallabh Vidyanagar, Gujarat, India (e-mail: bhuvanesh_oza@
yahoo.com).
S. M. Brahma is with the Electrical Engineering Department, Widener Uni-
versity, Chester, PA 19013, USA (e-mail: Sukumar.M.Brahma@widener.edu).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRS.2005.846200
0885-8950/$20.00 © 2005 IEEE
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER SYSTEMS, VOL. 20, NO.
The laboratory described in this paper is a result of the grant
of 1 500 000 rupees (approximately US$33 300) obtained form
the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE). The
laboratory is designed to be used for illustrating the fundamen-
tals of power system (concentrating more on protection) and as
a professional relay testing and high voltage testing facility. The
distinguishing aspects of this laboratory are several. All the ex-
periments in this laboratory are conceived, designed and imple-
mented through senior design projects. This helped in cutting
down the cost tremendously as the grant was used only in pur-
chasing high quality professional grade equipment for the lab-
oratory, instead of buying expensive integrated systems from
vendors. This also meant that a complete freedom to design
the laboratory was left to the students and the faculty involved.
This indeed led to a very innovative design. Every panel was so
designed that it looked and functioned very similar to a panel
in any actual substation. This gave the students, who subse-
quently performed the experiments as a part of their course-
work, a real-life feel of a power system. In addition, since this
approach allowed the purchase of professional grade equipment
from the grant money, some equipment could be used for pro-
fessional testing, generating revenue for the college.
The following sections describe the features of the laboratory
and the development process of the senior projects in detail.
II. PURCHASE AND USE OF EQUIPMENT
About 107 relays were purchased from the grant. These
included fifty one overcurrent relays, three thermal relays,
forty one auxiliary relays, seven differential relays, two motor
protection relays, one negative phase sequence relay and two
reverse power relays. The overcurrent relays were of all types
like directional, nondirectional, phase, ground, definite time,
instantaneous, and inverse definite minimum time (IDMT) with
varying degree of inverse curves. All the relays were either
electromechanical or static. The relays were bought during the
time period from the late eighties to the early nineties when
the cost of electromechanical and static relays was cheaper
than digital relays. The other consideration for buying these
relays was that about 98% or more relays in use all over the
country were of these types then and were likely to remain
in service for many years to come. Thus it was felt that the
graduating students must have an exposure to these types of
relays. However, from a subsequent grant, digital relays were
procured during the late nineties and are also used in this
laboratory now. The other major equipment bought from the
grant were an English Electric make overcurrent relay test set,
a 180–250-V, 100-A dc rectifier to provide auxiliary voltage to
the relays and contactors, thirty three-phase power contactors
and miscellaneous items like push buttons, semaphore and
OZA AND BRAHMA: DEVELOPMENT OF POWER SYSTEM PROTECTION LABORATORY
neon indicators, buzzers, control switches, capacitors, single
phase transformers, miniature circuit breakers (MCBs), etc. A
part of this grant was also utilized in procuring equipment for a
high-voltage laboratory including a 100-kV high-voltage trans-
former with related accessories, a 100-kV, 100-pF measuring
capacitor and an electrolytic tank.
Once the equipment were procured, the students started
working on designing and implementing different experiments
in groups of two or three for their senior projects guided by
faculty. Every year, about 30 to 35 students register for the
senior project (EE 421) course. Out of these, about 12 to 15
students worked for the laboratory development. The laboratory
was planned to serve four undergraduate courses. A list of the
experiments working now for each of these courses as a result
of this work is as follows.
A. Power System—I
In this junior level course, the following experiments were
created:
1) to observe the effect of a floating star point on a three-
phase distribution system;
2) to observe the voltage distribution along a string of sus-
pension insulators;
3) to observe the performance of a transmission line using
the short and the medium line models;
4) to observe the characteristics of an MCB.
B. Power System—II
In this junior level course, the following experiments were
created:
1) to observe the characteristics of a thermal relay;
2) to observe the characteristics of time delayed overcurrent
relays. This includes definite time and IDMT relays with
varying degree of inverse curves;
3) to observe the characteristics of a directional overcurrent
relay;
4) to observe the characteristics of a differential relay; both
biased and unbiased differential relays were used in this
experiment.
C. Power System Protection
In this senior level course, the following experiments were
created:
1) to understand the fundamentals of a radial protection
scheme;
2) to understand the fundamentals of the protection of two
parallel feeders;
3) to study the feeder protection scheme using two overcur-
rent and one earth fault relays;
4) to study generator differential protection;
5) to study transformer differential protection;
6) to study the protection of an induction motor;
7) to study the principles of reverse power protection.
In addition to these experiments, the students perform
some experiments involving testing insulation strengths of
different dielectric materials and field plotting as part of the
“High-Voltage Engineering” course at the junior level.
533
From the equipment described in this section, the relay testing
set and the high-voltage transformer are used for professional
testing purpose, thus generating revenue for the college.
Since it is not possible to describe how each of the exper-
iments is designed and implemented, the next section will
describe an experiment in power system protection that will
capture the innovative but simple design features and hardware
details of all the experiments.
III. DESCRIPTION OF HARDWARE AND EXPERIMENTS
In this section, the experiment designed to understand the
concept of radial feeder protection will be described. Fig. 1
shows the main circuit for the experiment. Three-line sections
are simulated by 9-ohm resistors, each being controlled by the
power contact of a contactor (C1-1, C2-1 and C3-1). The relay
for each section is an IDMT relay fed through a 10/5-A current
transformer (CT). Section III is connected to the load through
an MCB, which is the typical load controlling device at the con-
sumer end. This can be replaced by a fuse if so desired. The load
considered here is the equivalent load at the primary of the distri-
bution transformer at the consumer-end. The circuit is supplied
with 230-V, 50-Hz, single-phase ac supply. Except for experi-
ment number 3 in Section II-C, each experiment was built with a
single line circuit to economize on the number of relays required
for each experiment. This, by no means affects the insight of-
fered by the experiments, as the following description will show.
It is worthwhile to note here that all the overcurrent relays are
rated at 1 amp in order to be able to create faults without exces-
sively loading the utility source. This becomes a serious issue
especially when two experiments are performed simultaneously
by two groups of students. The switches S1, S2 and S3, when
switched on, simulate a fault in Sections I, II and III, respec-
tively. The location of the fault can be changed by changing the
variable terminal of the resistor modeling the line section. The
fault is made through a fault resistance of 18 ohms.
The students first calculate the relay settings required to coor-
dinate these three relays using the system data. They are given
the characteristics of the MCB, so relay R3 can be coordinated
with the MCB for faults beyond the MCB. Once this is done,
the students set the relay tap value (TV) and time setting multi-
plier (TSM) according to their calculations. The circuit is then
energized. Faults are created at both ends of each section and
the time of operation of the corresponding relays is measured
with a timer. When the relay operates, a bulb glows and a buzzer
operates. The student has to push the “accept” button on the
panel to acknowledge the operation of the relay to set the buzzer
off. The semaphore indicator shows the “open” status of the cir-
cuit breaker (contactor) when the contactor opens to isolate the
faulted section. This is exactly the way it happens in a real sub-
station. Fig. 2 shows the control circuit for the experiment.
As shown in Fig. 2, the control circuit is wired to a 110-V dc
supply simulating the battery bank in a substation. A rectifier is
used in the laboratory that supplies all the experiment-benches
with the required dc supply. In Fig. 2, R1-1, R2-1 and R3-1
are the main relay contacts. A1, A2 and A3 are the auxiliary
relay coils, which remain de-energized unless the corresponding
contact of the main relay closes. C1, C2 and C3 are the contactor
coils.
534
Fig. 1. Main circuit for the experiment on radial feeder protection.
Fig. 2. Control circuit for the experiment on radial feeder protection.
To energize the circuit, the circuit breakers (contactors here)
have to be turned on. This is done by pushing the button PB-1.
When PB-1 corresponding to the line Section I is pressed, the
contactor coil C1 will be energized since the normally closed
(NC) contact of A1, A1-1, is closed. This would make the con-
tactor “ON” closing the power contact C1-1 in the main circuit
shown in Fig. 1. This will also close the contact C1-2 to keep the
contactor coil energized after the push button PB-1 is released.
Similarly by pressing push buttons PB-1 associated with line
Sections II and III, the contactors C2 and C3, respectively, can
be made “ON.” Thus, the whole main circuit is energized (the
MCB is switched on manually). To open any “circuit breaker”
manually, the corresponding PB-2 push button has to be pressed.
As shown in Fig. 2, the bulbs L1, L2 and L3 are “ON” when the
corresponding contactors are “ON” and vice versa. These bulbs
are “circuit breaker status” bulbs on the panel.
Let us trace the operation pattern under a fault, when say,
relay R1 operates. This results in closing the contact R1-1,
which energizes the auxiliary relay coil A1. Since A1 ener-
gizes, the normally open (NO) contact A1-2 closes and the
auxiliary relay gets an alternate path to remain energized even
after the main relay drops off. The auxiliary relay will open
the contact A1-1 which results in the contactor coil C1 getting
de-energized opening the main contact C1-1 of the “circuit
breaker.” The operation of the other two relays will similarly
result into the opening of the corresponding “circuit breaker.”
The only difference in the control circuits of relays R2 and
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER SYSTEMS, VOL. 20, NO. 2, MAY 2005
R3 from that of R1 is the connection of switches T2 and T3.
These are used to check the back-up operation. If the switch
T2 is opened, the operation of relay R2 will not be able to
open the corresponding “circuit breaker” because A2 cannot
be energized. This simulates the “stuck” circuit breaker or a
problem with the control wiring that requires back up. The
students measure the operating time of the main relays as well
as the back up relays for different fault locations and compare
it with their calculations.
Fig. 3 shows the connection of the indicating devices, viz.,
alarm, bulb and semaphores. As can be seen from the figure,
as long as the contactor coil is energized, the corresponding
semaphore indicator coil is energized. This means that the sema-
phores will show the line section as “energized.” When the “cir-
cuit breaker” opens, the semaphore will indicate the de-ener-
gized status of the line section. Moreover, the operation of any
auxiliary relay (as a result of the main relay operating under a
fault) will close the corresponding contact (A1-3, A2-3 or A3-3)
activating the buzzer and the bulb. The user then has to press the
“accept” push button “PB3” in Fig. 2. This will de-energize the
auxiliary relay and deactivate the buzzer and the bulb in Fig. 3.
Fig. 4 shows how the operating time of a relay is measured.
A digital timer is used for this purpose. The fault-activating
switches S1, S2 and S3 are connected in parallel with the “start”
contact of the timer. The timer starts when the “start” contact
closes, which means, in this case, when the fault is created. The
timer stops when any of the auxiliary relay is energized by the
OZA AND BRAHMA: DEVELOPMENT OF POWER SYSTEM PROTECTION LABORATORY
Fig. 3. Indication and alarm circuit for the experiment on radial feeder
protection.
Fig. 4. Timer connections.
main relay, closing the corresponding contact A1-4, A2-4 or
A3-4. Thus, the timer measures the time between the inception
of a fault and the operation of a relay.
Through this experiment, students learn how a radial feeder
is protected. They learn to set the IDMT relays for such protec-
tion. They can verify their calculated setting by actual experi-
mentation. It is also possible to observe the effect of the source
impedance to line impedance ratio through this exper-
iment. Students verify that in Section III, where the ratio
is high, a normal-inverse IDMT relay does not provide signifi-
cant time discrimination for faults at two ends of the feeder (the
relay behaves almost like a definite time relay); whereas a very
inverse type IDMT relay performs much better. The energizing
of the circuit and the operation under fault are so designed that
during the performance of this whole experiment, the students
get a real-life like feel.
Fig. 5 shows the picture of the panel erected for the exper-
iment just described. It looks similar to a substation panel. As
can be seen from the picture, the panel has a one-line diagram of
the system with semaphore indicators. The pushbuttons to make
the “circuit breaker” on and off (PB1 and PB2) as well as the
“accept” push buttons PB3 for each section can be seen. The
relays and the MCB are mounted on the panel. The fault-cre-
ating switches S1, S2, S3 can also be seen. The switches T1 and
T2 are mounted on the backside to avoid confusion. The “cir-
cuit breaker status” bulbs and the alarm system of Fig. 3 are also
mounted on the panel. The contactors, auxiliary relays, rheostats
535
Fig. 5. Front panel view of the experiment.
and CTs are mounted on the bench at the back of the panel. Con-
trol wiring is done exactly as done in substations, using num-
bered ferrules to identify the two ends of a wire. The whole
experiment involving design, fitting the equipment, wiring and
commissioning constituted one senior project. Other projects in-
volved creating other experiments listed in Section II in a similar
way. Thus, the students were exposed to all aspects of a partic-
ular protection scheme and were challenged with translating all
the important features of the scheme to a user-friendly experi-
ment that can be used by future students.
IV. STAGES OF THE PROJECT DEVELOPMENT AND THE
MEASURING TOOLS
Now that the nature of the experiments and primary details
of the laboratory (the final product) is clear to the reader, the
stages in which the completion of the projects was achieved will
be described in this section. Measuring tools used for evaluation
will also be mentioned.
A. Stage 1: Groundwork
The faculty members first determined the experiments to be
performed in this laboratory to support the syllabus for the ex-
isting power curriculum. The part of the curriculum covered by
this laboratory deals with constructional, operational and mod-
eling details of power generation, transmission and distribution
systems, power system protection and high voltage engineering.
The experiments are already listed in Section II. This stage did
not involve any student input and was obviously accomplished
before the grant was procured.
B. Stage 2: Evolution of a Common Design Strategy
Once the project was funded, the faculty members involved
with the project met several times over one semester to work
out the implementation plan. The most challenging part of the
project was to design the experiments in such a way that they
can be implemented through senior design projects and yet not
lose the thoroughness in covering the related concepts. Thus,
both the hardware implementation and the educational delivery
were of essence.
The experiments described in Section II-A were already
being performed at the time the proposal was written, but were
536
not permanently mounted. So it was decided to make them a
part of the laboratory in the form of dedicated desktop panels.
The thrust of the laboratory was on developing new experiments
in Power System Protection as listed in Section II-B and II-C.
Since the basic nature of these experiments and the equipments
required for them were similar, it was possible to employ a
common hardware strategy for all the experiments. It was felt
that this would standardize some design aspects and hence
would make it easier to implement the experiments through
senior design projects.
Several ideas were considered to be adopted as a common
hardware strategy. Finally, it was decided to have all the exper-
iments reflect the appearance and operation in a real substation.
This was an important step because this was the feature that was
most appreciated by all evaluators as unique. Circuit drawings
of an actual substation were studied, which led to the formation
of a general idea of the main, control and indication circuitry
similar to those shown in Figs. 1, 2 and 3 and the general ap-
pearance shown in Fig. 5. It is easy to see that these circuits
resemble closely to the wiring diagram in any substation, and
the panel view resembles the panel of a substation. It was also
decided to use rheostats to represent transmission and distribu-
tion lines, because they enable to change the fault location easily
and are very cost effective. It was also decided to model the load
with a rheostat to make it variable in order to observe the effect
of the load current on relay settings. The design of the measure-
ment circuitry was left for the students. Again, this stage did not
involve any input from students.
C. Stage 3: Design
Now a group of three students was chosen to develop the first
experiment. This experiment happened to the one described in
Section III. The design tasks accomplished by the students can
be subdivided as below:
1. To be completely familiar with the underlying theory for
the experiment they were assigned.
The participating students had taken two basic courses
in Power Systems (Power System I and Power System
II) at this point of time. This gave them knowledge of
different types of relays, in addition to the constructional,
operational and modeling details of power generation,
transmission and distribution systems. In addition, they
registered for a course on Power System Protection
concurrently with the project. Therefore, this task was
accomplished in one week.
2. To develop the experiment setup, procedure, learning out-
comes, experiment-specific main, control and indication
circuits as well as panel design.
The formation of procedure and learning outcomes
took two weeks and needed close interaction with faculty.
Since the general idea of the circuitry was already formed
by faculty members as described in Section IV-B, the
students came up with the specific circuits in Figs. 1, 2, 3
and the panel design in Fig. 5 in two weeks.
3. To determine the ratings of the equipment to be used.
The important factor considered here was to limit
the load on the electrical outlets (230 volts, 50 hertz,
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER SYSTEMS, VOL. 20, NO. 2, MAY 2005
single-phase) during normal and faulted operation. This
determined the maximum load and fault current values
allowed. Using these values, continuous and short time
ratings of equipment like rheostats, contactors, current
transformers, and relays were determined. Ratings of the
indication devices, push buttons and the auxiliary relays
were determined from the dc rectifier output voltage (110
volts). This was accomplished in one week. Now, circuits
shown in Figs. 1, 2 and 3 were finalized to the last detail.
D. Stage 4: Installation, Commissioning, Documentation,
and Presentation
Once the ratings were approved by the faculty, the equipments
were ordered. There were no budgetary constraints imposed on
the students. Since all the other experiments were to be designed
with this common strategy, and hence would have similar rat-
ings, the faculty could order the equipment in bulk. This intro-
duced some delay for the first senior project group, but for all
other experiments in later years, the time to order equipment
was saved. This was another advantage of the common design
strategy. The equipment list is given in Section II. Most of the
items were available with the local vendors. All the required
items except relays could be procured in less than four weeks.
The students utilized this time in working on the measurement
circuit design (see Fig. 4) and in preparing the wooden panel
shown in Fig. 5. Since the students had used timers in other
experiments, designing the measurement circuit was easily ac-
complished. The panel, with the necessary slots (for relays) cut,
and holes (for push buttons, bulbs, buzzer, semaphores, switches
and terminals) drilled, was mounted on a desk top with right
angle clamps, leaving about one foot wide desk-space behind
the panel.
As the equipments arrived, the work on installation of com-
ponents and wiring the circuit started. The circuit was connected
adhering to the practices adopted in wiring sub station panels.
Ferrules were used to identify wires and the wires were bunched
up behind the panel. CTs, contactors and auxiliary relays were
mounted on the desktop surface behind the panel. Rheostats
were mounted on the rear flank of the desk itself. The process
took about three weeks.
Finally, the students performed the experiment, recorded all
readings, prepared a written report and presented formally to a
panel consisting of faculty and local industry representatives.
They also had to present their progress to the faculty twice
during the semester in the form of a slide presentation.
During the course of the project, a very close interaction
between the students and the faculty was maintained. Weekly
meetings provided the required brainstorming and monitoring.
During the physical implementation, the faculty supervised the
project almost on a daily basis. The initial planning and de-
tailing were done with so much care and collective inputs, and
followed up by such close collaboration, that every experiment
operated as intended.
E. Other Experiments
The experiments described in Section II-A were relatively
easy to implement. A group of two students worked over a
six-month period to implement each of these experiments. The
OZA AND BRAHMA: DEVELOPMENT OF POWER SYSTEM PROTECTION LABORATORY
experiments listed in Section II-B required a relay-testing panel.
Two desktop panels were created to accommodate all the re-
lays. Each panel was designed and commissioned by a group
three students. In these projects, the students designed and im-
plemented a comprehensive relay testing circuit that measured
the supplied current and/or the applied voltage as well as the
time of operation of a relay, automatically disconnecting the
supply as soon as the relay operated. The features of the cir-
cuit were similar to the circuits shown in Fig. 2 and Fig. 4. This
circuit produced results comparable with the results from the
professional relay testing set mentioned in Section II.
Each experiment described in Section II-C was considered as
a senior project and was undertaken by a group of three stu-
dents. The high voltage part of the laboratory was profession-
ally installed as a part of the purchase agreement, since this
was beyond the scope of the students. All projects lasted for
one semester. It is worthwhile to mention here that the semester
involved a three-week winter break, which was utilized by the
students for concentrated effort. The listed projects were com-
pleted over a period of five years.
F. Measuring Tools and Dissemination
The quality of the project itself (the hardware development)
was evaluated by representatives from local industry as well as
faculty. The effectiveness of the educational delivery provided
by the resulting experiments has been evaluated over the years
by alumni who performed the experiments as part of their
coursework. Both evaluations have been extremely positive.
Several alumni who joined power utilities after graduation felt
very comfortable working in a substation due to being exposed
to a similar environment in the laboratory. The laboratory is
being used as a model by some of the new colleges coming up
in the state of Gujarat. This laboratory has also been lavishly
praised as one of its kind by a visiting committee from the
All India Council of Technical Education as well as officially
recognized by the Director of Technical Education for the state
of Gujarat. For further dissemination, the authors are planning
to design a web page associated with the college web site
(http://bvm.ecvm.net/) or with one of the authors’ home pages
(http://quantum.soe.widener.edu:344/PS_Lab_BVM.html)
where the laboratory manuals for all experiments will be made
available.
V. CONCLUSION
The paper describes a power system laboratory unique in
some ways. It is prepared fully through senior projects. This
has enabled the college to spend the entire grant in procuring
quality equipment. From a really small sum of approximately
US$ 33 000, a laboratory has been created that encompasses all
major fundamentals of power system through insightful exper-
iments. This is very crucial for colleges in developing coun-
tries. The laboratory is being used by approximately 180 stu-
dents every year as a part of their coursework. In addition, the
students from other nearby colleges regularly come to perform
experiments in this laboratory. Another novel feature of the lab-
oratory is that it provides a real substation like operating envi-
ronment, especially for the protection related experiments. The
537
high voltage transformer and the relay testing set procured with
this grant, in addition to being used for experiments, are used
for professional testing too, thus generating revenue for the col-
lege. The process of fully integrating digital relays into the ex-
periments is ongoing and constitutes the second phase of the
laboratory. This phase aims at creating experiments using these
relays that can illustrate, along with the protection fundamen-
tals, the full capability of these relays to the students.
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Bhuvanesh A. Oza was born in Rajkot, India, in
1950. He received the B.E. and M.E. degrees, both in
electrical engineering, from Sardar Patel University,
Gujarat, India, in 1972 and 1982, respectively.
His industrial experience from 1974 to 1986
includes working with Rakot Phones Subdivision,
Baroda Meters, and Gujarat Electricity Board
(GEB). At Baroda Meters, he was in charge of
energy meter production. At GEB, he was part of a
22-member team to commission unit number five of
Ukai Thermal Power Station, Gujarat. Since 1986, he
has been with Birla Vishvakarma Mahavidyalaya Engineering College, Vallabh
Vidyanagar, India, first as a Lecturer and from 1990 onwards as an Assistant
Professor. His areas of interest are power system protection and operation.
Sukumar M. Brahma (S’00–M’04) was born in
Ahmedabad, India, in 1966. He received the B.Eng.
degree from Lalbhai Dalpatbhai College of Engi-
neering, Ahmedabad, India, in 1989, the M.Tech.
degree from the Indian Institute of Technology,
Bombay, India, in 1997, and the Ph.D. in electrical
engineering from Clemson University, Clemson, SC,
in 2003.
From 1990 to 1999, he was a Lecturer in the
Electrical Engineering Department with Birla
Vishvakarma Mahavidyalaya Engineering College,
Vallabh Vidyanagar, India. He is presently an Assistant Professor at Widener
University, Chester, PA. His research interests are power system analysis,
protection, and operation.