EMC14/Tokyo

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Impact of Malaysian EMF Standard on

Electrical Line Design and Performance
Boniface H.K. Chia
Transmission Department
Sarawak Energy Berhad
Kuching, Malaysia
boni@sarawakenergy.com.my

Abstract Overhead transmission lines generate electric and

magnetic fields at power frequency. These fields play an
important role in transmission line design and occupational
safety standards compliance. Typically, the EMF exposure limits
for electrical line design in Malaysia is based on established
international or national standard of developed countries due to
lack of local standard on EMF exposure limit. Malaysian
Standards has published new requirement for electric and
magnetic exposure limit recently. This paper presents the impact
to the electrical line design and performance in meeting EMF
emission limits based on the new standard. The associated
financial impact, corona related environmental impacts and
lightning performance of the lines are evaluated and discussed.
KeywordsLine Design, Electric Field, Magnetic Field,
Lightning Performance, SIRIM

I.

INTRODUCTION

Standard practices for electric and magnetic field exposure

limits in Malaysia are based on established international or
national standard of developed countries. One of the adopted
legacy standards is based on NESC (National Electrical Safety
Code USA) recommendation. The threshold values of the
induced current in the vicinity of transmission line during worst
case shall not exceed 5mA. Any 50-60Hz current in excess of
the release threshold of an individual could be regarded as
hazardous and potentially lethal.
Currently, there is no regulation in controlling EMF in
Malaysia. However, SIRIM (Standards and Industrial Research
Institute of Malaysia) has issued Malaysian Standards of
limiting EMF (Electric, Magnetic and Electromagnetic Fields)
exposure accordingly to [1] which is based on international
standards ICNIRP (International Commission on Non-Ionizing
Radiation Protection) [2], commonly adopted practice by other
countries.
The new Malaysian Standard was drafted by technical
committee formed by stakeholders representation from
regulatory authorities, government agencies, national electricity
utilities and universities. The standard was released as the
Malaysian Standards (MS 2232-1:2009) in year 2010. MS
2232 comes in two parts with part 1 for power lines and part 2
for radiofrequency and microwave radiation. The reference
level for power lines exposures is tabulated in Table 1
ICNIRPs electric field limit could affect transmission line
design for operating voltage less than 345kV [3]. Substantial

Copyright 2014 IEICE

tower height would need to be increased in order to meet the

ICNIRPs stringent requirement in comparison with the
standard practice for 275kV line design.
TABLE 1: Reference level for power lines exposures
Basic
Reference Levels
restriction
Exposure
Induced
Electric
Magnetic flux density
Characteristics
current
field
Microtesla
Milligauss
density
strength
(T)
(mG)
(mA/m)
(kV/m)
Occupational
10
10
500
5000
General public
2
5
100
1000

This paper presents the impact to the electrical line design

in meeting the emission limits based on the recent published
Malaysian Standard. The associated financial impact, corona
related environmental impact and lightning performance of the
line arose from the change in tower geometry will be evaluated.
II.

STANDARD 275KV DESIGN PRACTICE IN MALAYSIA

The standard 275kV Line design is single tower double

circuit type with vertical phase arrangement and twin/ quad
bundle conductors of 450mm spacing. The standard conductor
used for the 275kV transmission line is ACSR Drake according
to ASTM B-232 standard. The associated earthwires is ACSR
Skunk according to IEC 209 and to BS 215/2/79 standards.
The 275kV lines is installed with differential insulation
level (LOW and HIGH) in order to avoid simultaneous
outages of both circuits. The insulator is made of porcelain
with 18 units (Lightning Insulation Withstand, LIW = 1200kV)
per string on LOW circuit and 20 units (LIW = 1600kV) on
HIGH circuit.
The line is designed with two earthwires on tower top, in
symmetrical horizontal arrangement with zero degrees
shielding angle to all phase conductors. The line lightning
performance is to keep the line lightning performance at a rate
of less than one outage per 100km-year-circuit.
The tower is designed to have the minimum 7m vertical
ground clearance at maximum sag to fulfilled NESC safety
limit of maximum 5mA induced current for largest vehicle
anticipated under or near transmission line [3]. The standard
Right-Of-Way for 275kV overhead line is 20m from the centre
of the tower. Refer to Fig.1 for typical suspension tower
geometry at 275kV level.

625

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III.

16A1-H2

ELECTRIC AND MAGNETIC FIELDS CALCULATION

75kV transmission
The electric field caused by the studied 27
m above ground at
line at power frequency is calculated at 1.7m
different lateral distances from the line centree within the Rightof way. The maximum allowable operaating voltage and
conductor height at maximum sag is selecteed to cater for the
worst case scenario. The tower geometry to be considered for
the calculation is based on typical standard Design for 275kV
Lines (See Fig.1).

variability of highest and low

west EMF emissions. Both the
electric field and magnetic field
f
are calculated via EPRI
application software EMF-2 andd EMF-6 respectively.
IV.

DISCUSSIO
ON ON THE RESULTS

The results indicate that thee electric field is complying with

MS 2232-1 requirements att the edge of Right-of-way.
However, electric field requireement is not fulfilled within the
w reactance phase arrangement.
Right-of-way even with the low
The most effective mitigatioon measure to this is to increase
greatest influence on the
the line height which has the
t
d [3]. The line height can be
maximum field at the ground
increased via the empirical equaation as follow:

where

m depends on line config

guration
E = Electric field
H = Line height

From the empirical formuula, the electric field at ground

level can be reduced by increaasing the ground clearance from
7m to 10m. The electric fielld exposure limit of 5kV/m is
fulfilled for the case of low reactance arrangement i.e. the
highest electric field reduced frrom 8.91kV/ m to 4.75kV/ m. In
an electric field of 4.75kV, the maximum induced current for a
tractor (total length 13.8m) under/
near the line would be
u
per kV/m [3]).
1.9mA (base on coefficient of 0.40mA
0

Electric Field at 1.7m above ground

Eelectric field (V/m)

10000
9000
8000
7000
6000
5000
4000
3000
2000
1000
0
-20 -18 -16 -14 -12 -10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0

8 10 12 14 16 18 20

Horizontal Distance (m)

H

Fig.1 Typical tower geometry at 275kV level (N

Normal suspension)

The relative phasing of the two circuits has

h profound effect
ABCon the electric field at ground level. Phase arrangement
a
abc is called superbundle which generally correspond to the
highest electric field and magnetic field, at ground level. Phase
arrangement ABC-cba is called low reactannce and generally
corresponds to lowest electric field and magnetic field at
ground. Thus, calculation will only consider superbundle and
low reactance arrangement for comparison and to obtain the

Copyright 2014 IEICE

626

ABC-cba (7m)

ABC-abc (10m)

ABC-cbs(10m)

Fig.2 Electric Fiield calculation results

Magnetic Field at 1.7m above ground

500

Magnetic field (mG)

The three phase transmission circuuits are assumed

y shield wires is
symmetric. The electric field caused by
hey were infinitely
neglected. The conductors are treated as if th
long and parallel to a flat conductive earth. For
F the calculation
of magnetic field, the maximum anticipateed line current is
at the
assumed to flow in the conductor and to be concentrated
c
mage currents in the
center of each conductor bundle. Both the im
earth and the magnetic field caused by thee shield wires are
neglected.

ABC-abc (7
7m)

400
300
200
100
0
-20 -18 -16 -14 -12 -10 -8 -6 -4 -2 0

8 10 12 14 16 18 20

Horizontal Distance (m)

ABC-abc (7m))

ABC-cba (7m)

m)
ABC-abc (10m

ABC-cba (10m)

Fig.3 Magnetic F
Field calculation results

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The results of magnetic field calculation results show that

the ground level magnetic field at 1.7m above ground is much
less than maximum allowable threshold of MS 2232-1.
However, the results show that 10m ground clearance has
tremendous improvement to magnetic field at the centre of
Right-of-way in comparison with that of 7m ground clearance,
i.e. the highest magnetic field reduced from 422.64 to
244.05mG for the case of low reactance arrangement.
V.

LIGHTNING PERFORMANCE STUDY

The need to increase ground clearance to meet the required

electric field emission limit leads to substantial increase in
tower height. This is prone to more lightning flashes to the line
and subsequently causes the total lightning flashover rate to
increase.

where:
CFO = Critical flashover voltage in kV.
t = Time to flashover in sec.
L = Insulation Striking Distance (m)

Lightning performance of transmission lines is based on the

sum of the SFFOR (Shielding Failure Rate) and BFR
(Backflash Rate), and the results are as tabulated in Table 3.
The results indicate that with the 3m increase in ground
clearance, the estimated number of flashes to the line increased
from 412 to 431 flashes/ 100km-year. The associated Total
Flashover Rate increase from 1.75 to 1.96/ 100km-year due to
high failure rate at the LOW circuit. The Total Flashover
Rate could be reduced to 1.67/ 100km-year by increasing one
insulator to each of the circuit.
VI.

TABLE 2: Input data for lightning performance calculation

1
2
3

Input data
Ground Flash Density
Span
Sag

Conductor

Shield wire

6
7
8
9
10

Tower Geometry
Tower Model
Insulator type
Phase arrangement
Footing resistance

Selected value
16 flashes/ km-year
300m
Conductor: 8.17m
Shield wire: 7.353m
Configuration: Triplex
Type: ACSR Drake
Spacing: 450mm
Number: 2
Type: OPGW skunk equivalent
Shielding angle: zero
See Fig.2
Waist
Normal
Low Reactance
10

The impact of tower height increase to other corona-related

phenomena, including Audible Noise (AN), EMI interference
and corona power loss was evaluated.
A. Calculation method
The Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) is calculated based
on empirical method developed by BPA with frequency
measurement selected at 0.5MHz at 15m from outside phase
[4]. The audible noise is calculated as the L50 rain intensity
based on widely used EPRI and BPA empirical formula [3].
Corona loss is calculated based on few empirical formulas for
comparison to obtain variability of the phenomenon. Empirical
formulas used for corona loss calculation include EDF, IREQ
and BPA. All the calculations were performed with EPRI
application software. See [3] and Appendix for details of the
empirical formula.

TABLE 3: Lightning performance calculation results

Description
Insulator_LOW (num)
CFO_LOW (kV)
Insulator_HIGH (num)
CFO_HIGH (kV)
Estimated number of Flashes to the Line
(flashes/100km-year)
Combined impedance of shield wires ()
Tower surge impedance ()
Upper
LOW
Critical current for shielding
Middle
failure (kA)
Lower
Upper
HIGH
Critical current for shielding
Middle
failure (kA)
Lower
Upper
LOW
Critical
current
for
Middle
backflashover (kA)
Lower
Upper
HIGH
Critical
current
for
Middle
backflashover (kA)
Lower
LOW
Upper
BFR for each phase
Middle
Lower
HIGH
Upper
BFR for each phase
Middle
Lower
Flashover rates
SFFOR
[events/100km-year]
BFR
TFR

7m
clearance
18
1537.4
20
1708.2
412

10m
clearance
18
1537.8
20
1708.2
431

10m
clearance
19
1622.80
21
1793.60
431

257.86
142.16
11.62
10.17
9.45
13.05
11.40
10.57
203.85
207.44
0.00
221.62
0.00
0.00
0.81
0.70
0.00
0.23
0.00
0.00
0.00
1.75
1.75

262.98
144.69
10.89
9.84
9.24
12.22
11.02
10.34
198.52
201.30
214.88
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.91
0.79
0.26
0.00
0.00
0.00
0.00
1.96
1.96

261.60
144.69
11.55
10.43
9.79
12.89
11.61
10.89
211.02
214.29
0.00
228.38
0.00
0.00
0.78
0.67
0.00
0.22
0.00
0.00
0.00
1.67
1.67

B. Results findings
The sensitivity study for conductor surface gradient to the
conductor average height above ground is shown in Fig.4. The
simulated results show that the influence of average conductor
height to conductor surface gradient is trivial. Consequently,
the increased in tower height of 3m does not result in
significant change to corona related environmental effects.
The comparison results are as tabulated in Table 4.

Lightning performance of the line was calculated via IEEE

Flash (version 2.00) program. The input data used for the
calculation are as presented in Table 2. Considering the
standard lightning-impulse waveshapes, the Critical Flashover
Voltage (CFO) of the insulation is approximated as follow [3]:
400

Copyright 2014 IEICE

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT

710
.

627

Fig.4 Conductor surface gradient sensitivity study results

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TABLE 4: Corona-related phenomena calculation results

1
2
3
4

Corona Phenomena
Voltage surface gradient (kV/cm)
EMI (dB)
Fair weather
Rain
Audible Noise (dBA)
EPRI L50 Rain
BPA L50 Rain
Corona loss (W/m)
BPA (Rain)
IREQ (Heavy rain)
Efd (Rain)

7m clearance
11.29

10m clearance
11.28

23.2
48.2

22.9
47.9

18.6
24.7

18.1
24.2

2.87
4.54
7.20

2.86
4.54
7.18

cost component breakdown in Table 5, it is expected that the

overall line cost will be increased by approximately 6-10% for
the condition of good terrain and ground condition (assuming
10% increase in overall construction cost, 4-5% increase in
pile concrete block volume for all tower type and 5-10%
variation in design).
VIII. CONCLUSION

VII. FINANCIAL IMPACT

Based on the international surveys carried out in 1989-90
[3], the cost breakdown for lines between 150 and 300kV is
reproduced as below:

Category
150-300kV

TABLE 5: Summary of line component costs

Component
Conductor
Shield
Insulators
Structure
Foundation

Percentage
31.6
4.1
8.8
36
19.5

Material
Construction

64.3
35.7

The needs to increase tower height and insulation level

incur cost increase in structure, foundation and insulator of the
line component. The anticipated cost increase to the respective
line component cost is calculated based on linear proportion
method and the results are as tabulated in Table 6.
TABLE 6: Anticipated increment in line component cost
Component

Tower Type

Structure

NS
HS
LA
MA
HA

Foundation

Tower Type
HA (Light concrete)
HA (Heavy concrete)

Insulator

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The author gratefully acknowledges Syarikat SESCo
Berhad for kind permission to publish this paper and special
thanks to S.M.Chai, U.T.Wong, K.K.Tan and U.K.Wong for
their advice on civil structural design works.
REFERENCES

Incremental
Tower Mass
Material Cost
(kg/tower)
(%)
~750
~8.8
~810
~9
~1250
~10
~1950
~13.5
~2250
~12.5
Concrete volume
(m/tower)
~8
~21

There is a need to increase tower height by a minimum of

3m in meeting electric field exposure limit based on recent
published Malaysian Standard (MS 2232-1:2009). This incurs
material cost increase to insulator, structure and foundation.
However, the overall increase in line cost is approximately 610%. The results of magnetic field calculation results showed
that the ground level magnetic field is much less than
maximum allowable threshold. Both the maximum electric and
magnetic fields within the Right-Of-Way are almost halved by
the 3m increase in tower height. Substantial increases in tower
height results in more lightning flashes to the line and
constitute to increase in Total Flashover Rate. The line
insulator would need to increase by one insulator to each of the
circuit to improve the lightning performance to the line. The
simulated results showed that 3m increase in tower does not
result in significant improvement to corona related
environmental phenomena.

[1]

[2]
[3]

Material Cost
(%)
~17
~24

[4]

Tower Type

Insulator unit
Material Cost
(num/ circuit)
(%)
All type
1
~5.56
Note: NS Normal suspension, HS Heavy suspension, LA Light angle,
MA Medium angle, HA Heavy angle

APPENDIX
Emprical equation for EMI developed by BPA
46

The total tower mass increased by 750-2200kg per tower

which corresponds to average incremental of 10% in structural
material cost. The volume of heavy and light concrete block
increased by 8m/tower and 21m/tower respectively for
Heavy Angle (HA) tower. This corresponds to 20%
incremental in foundation material cost on average. However,
the incremental to concrete volume of other tower type is
trivial. The need to increase in 1 insulator per circuit
corresponds to 5.6% incremental in material cost on insulator.

120

40

1 /

..(1)

Emprical equation for Audible Noise developed by BPA(2,4) / EPRI (3,5)

For n<3,
55log

120log

20log

44log

115.4
75.2

11.4log .(2)
10log

0.02 ....(3)

For n3,
26.4log
20

55log

120log

128.4
.

44

67.9

11.4log .(4)
10

0.02 ...(5)

Emprical equation for corona loss by EDF (7)/ IREQ (6)/ BPA (8)

Incremental cost on structure and foundation are the main

contribute to overall increase in line cost. These components
depend largely on terrain and ground conditions. Based on the

Copyright 2014 IEICE

Malaysian Standard, MS 2232-1:2009 Guidelines for limiting

exposure to time-varying electric, magnetic and electromagnetic fields
Part 1: For frequency up to 30kHz.
ICNIRP 1998. Guidelines for Limiting Exposure to Time-Varying
Electric, Magnetic and Electromagnetic Fields (Up to 300GHz).
EPRI, EPRI AC Transmission Line Reference Book 200kV and
above, 3rd Edition, December 2005.
IEEE Radio Noise and Corona Subcommittee Report, Review of
technical considerations on limits to inteference from power lines and
stations, vol. PAS-99, No.1 Jan/ Feb, 1980.

628

,
1

14.2

65

...(6)

(7)
.

40

(8)