www.astesj.com 577 A Support Vector Machine Based Technique for Fault Detection in A Power Distribution Integrated System with Renewable Energy Distributed Generation Katleho Moloi * , Yskandar Hamam, Jacobus Andries Jordaan Faculty of Built Environment and Engineering, Dept. of Electrical Engineering, Tshwane University of Technology, Pretoria, 1035, South Africa A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T Article history: Received: .18 May, 2020 Accepted: 17 July, 2020 Online: 19 August, 2020 The integration of renewable energy distributed generation (REDG) into the energized distribution power grid has become more popular in recent years. This has been escalated by the general global energy shortages. The REDG has proven to be effective for energy sustainability and reliability. However, there are technical challenges which arise from integrating REDG into the energized power grid. These challenges include the effectiveness of power grid protection against faults. In this paper, a fault diagnostic algorithm is proposed to detect faults in a power system integrated with REDGs. The algorithm utilizes wavelet packet transform (WPT) for signal filtering, support vector machine (SVM) for fault classification and detection. The proposed algorithm is validated using the Eskom 90 bus electrical system and the results obtained show that faults can be detected with a high accuracy of 99%. The Eskom 90 bus system is modelled using DigSilent platform and the algorithm is tested on the WEKA software. Keywords: Fault Detection Feature Extraction Packet Wavelet Transform Power System Integration Renewable Energy Sources Support Vector Machine 1. Introduction The reliable and sustainable source of energy plays a critical role for the potential growth in a state [1]. The global energy sector has been faced with many challenges over the years, such as energy shortages, high levels of air pollution from burning fossil fuel to generate electricity, and the high cost of coal. These problems have led to finding an alternative source of electricity supply to meet the required demands. Renewable energy distribution generators (REDG) for instance, photovoltaic (PV), wind turbine (WT), hydropower, biomass, etc.…, have been effective for energy supply with minimum environmental impact. The flexible introduction of REDGs enables their application to be necessary for formulating a power mix framework for energy sustainability. The integration of REDGs into the existing distribution power grid has numerous practical aids such as voltage improvement, dependability increase, network performance increase, and power loss minimization [2, 3]. However, integrating REDGs into the power distribution grid changes the traditional trajectory of the energy supply. These changes in the power flow may influence the power balance of the entire power grid [4]. Furthermore, the meteorological and geological dependency of REDGs affects the expansion planning of the power grid, which results in escalated operational costs [5]. Coupled with these problems are there technical effects that arise from integrating REDGs into the power grid such as frequency variation [6], voltage fluctuations [7], reliable and secure power flow [8, 9]. Generally, the performance of the power grid with or without REDGs highly depends on the reliability of the protection system. The high penetration level of REDGs into the grid affects the traditional topology of the protection system. This may result in a catastrophic incident if a fault is not cleared timeously and with great effect. Integrating REDGs into the existing power grid has operational challenges that may affect the technical performance of the system. These challenges include voltage variations, power supply forecasting, frequency fluctuation and load demand management. A power system grid is prone to faults, whether internally or externally. Electrical protection schemes are essential to timeously eradicate the presence of a fault in the power system [10, 11]. In recent years, numerous methods for power system fault diagnostic have been proposed. In [12], a method base on voltage imbalances and third harmonic distortion (THD) was used to determine the faulty section for an integrated power system network. The passive methods including frequency variations [13, 14], degree of alteration of power frequency [15], power and voltage variation ASTESJ ISSN: 2415-6698 * Corresponding Author: Katleho Moloi, moloikt023@gmail.com Advances in Science, Technology and Engineering Systems Journal Vol. 5, No. 4, 577-588 (2020) www.astesj.com https://dx.10.25046/aj050468