472

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 1, JANUARY 2005

A Double Logarithmic Approximation

of Carsons Ground-Return Impedance
Taku Noda, Member, IEEE

AbstractThis paper proposes a simple closed-form formula of

the ground-return impedance of horizontal parallel wires above
a lossy ground plane. It is derived by a double logarithmic approximation of the integral term with a semi-innite interval in
Carsons ground-return impedance formula. The proposed double
logarithmic approximation gives better accuracy compared to a
similar approximation proposed by Pizarro and Eriksson, and this
is achieved by an advanced optimization technique used for determining the coefcients in the double logarithmic approximation
and also by incorporating an additional variable which minimizes
errors. In this paper, it is shown, using practical examples, that the
derived formula gives more accurate results compared with other
existing approximate formulas. It is also shown that a graphical interpretation of the double logarithmic approximation is to replace
a homogeneous lossy ground with a pair of perfectly conducting
return planes located at different complex depths.
Index TermsApproximation methods, electromagnetic transient analysis, ground-wave propagation, impedance, lossy
circuits, power distribution lines, power transmission lines, skin
effect, surges.

I. INTRODUCTION

ROUND-RETURN impedance of horizontal parallel

wires above a lossy ground plane was rst satisfactorily
derived by Carson [1] and Pollaczek [2] independently in 1926.
The expression includes an integral term with a semi-innite
interval, and Carson gave its series and asymptotic expansions
for numerical evaluation [1]. According to Magnusson et al.,
the integral term can be expressed in a closed form using
Struves function of the rst order and Bessels function of the
second kind and the rst order [3], but the numerical evaluation of the expression likewise requires series and asymptotic
expansions. A single logarithmic approximation of the integral
term was studied by different researchers [4][8]. Alvarado and
Betancourt proposed a correction term to the single logarithmic
approximation [9], and Pizarro and Eriksson used a double
logarithmic approximation [10], both to improve accuracy.
This paper proposes a simple closed-form formula of the
ground-return impedance. The double logarithmic approximation proposed by Pizarro and Eriksson [10] is enhanced
by using an advanced optimization technique for determining
the coefcients in the expression and also by incorporating an
additional variable. The additional variable minimizes errors in
mutual impedance by representing the variation of the optimum
coefcient values with respect to the ratio of the horizontal

Manuscript received November 3, 2004; revised March 1, 2005. Paper no.

TPWRD-00521-2004.
The author is with the Electric Power Engineering Research Lab, Central
Research Institute of Electric Power Industry, Yokosuka, Japan (e-mail:
takunoda@ieee.org).
Digital Object Identier 10.1109/TPWRD.2005.852307

Fig. 1. Sectional conguration of a transmission line.

separation of two wires to their heights. The enhanced double

logarithmic approximation is then applied to the integral term
in the CarsonPollaczek expression to obtain the proposed
closed-form formula. In this paper, it is shown, using practical
examples of a distribution line case and a 500-kV transmission-line case, that the derived formula gives more accurate
results compared with other existing approximate formulas.
It is also shown that a graphical interpretation of the double
logarithmic approximation is to replace a homogeneous lossy
ground with a pair of perfectly conducting planes located at
different complex depths.
II. CARSONS GROUND-RETURN IMPEDANCE
A. Integral Expression
Consider a multiphase transmission line consisting of
conductors. Its sectional conguration for the th and the th
conductor is shown in Fig. 1. The conductors are cylindrical
straight wires parallel to the ground plane, and the ground
soil is assumed to be homogeneous with conductivity . The
of the air and the ground is the same as that of
permeability
a vacuum. Assuming a quasi-transverse electric mode (TEM)
mode of propagation, Carson and Pollaczek independently
derived the following ground-return impedance formula [1], [2]
(1)
(2)
where
(3)
and
is angular frequency. This is a common expression
for both the self and mutual impedances. To obtain the self
of the th conductor, we substitute
impedance

0885-8977/$20.00 2006 IEEE

NODA: DOUBLE LOGARITHMIC APPROXIMATION OF CARSONS GROUND-RETURN IMPEDANCE

into (1) and (2). The mutual impedance

the th conductor is obtained by

between the th and

As shown in Fig. 1, and are the radius and the height of the
th conductor and
is the horizontal separation between the
th and the th conductor. The -by- matrix , whose entries
are obtained by (1) and (2), is the ground-return impedance
matrix of the transmission line.
Since the quasi-TEM assumption made for deriving (1) and
(2) is valid approximately up to 10 MHz, which is sufcient for
most power engineering applications, an accurate approximation of (2) is of importance.

473

It is easily shown that approximating in (1) by (6) is equivalent

to approximating the integral term in (2) and, thus, in (7) by

(9)
where
(10)
A. Matching the Limiting Value at 0 Frequency
and
When is approaching zero (at zero frequency),
in (8) are also approaching zero. Thus, the asymptotic form of
is expressed by
(7) for

B. Existing Logarithmic Approximations

(11)

The single logarithmic approximation studied in [4][8] is to

approximate (1) and (2) by

where
is Eulers constant. On the other
hand, the asymptotic form of (9) for
is

(4)
where
(5)

(12)
Comparing this equation with (11), we obtain the condition
(13)

The double logarithmic approximation proposed by Pizarro and

Eriksson [10] approximates (1) and (2) by

For the derivations of (11) and (12), see Appendix A.

B. Matching the Limiting Value at
For

Frequency

(at innite frequency), that is, for

, the asymptotic form of (7) is expressed by

(6)
,
,
, and
where the constants
are determined by a least-squares process using the
Prony algorithm [11].

and
(14)

The asymptotic form of (9) for

is
(15)

Comparison of (14) and (15) gives the condition

III. PROPOSED DOUBLE LOG. APPROXIMATION

The proposed double logarithmic approximation basically
uses (6), but now , , , and are not treated as constants.
The expressions that give the values of , , , and are
derived by matching the limiting value at the innite frequency
with the corresponding exact value and by incorporating an
additional variable which minimizes errors in the mutual
impedance.
According to [3], the integral term in (2) can be analytically
evaluated and expressed using Struves function of the rst order
and Bessels function of the second kind and the rst
order

(7)
where
(8)

(16)
For the derivations of (14) and (15), see Appendix B.
C. Practical Ranges of Parameter Values
In (2), if the integration variable
, we obtain

is replaced with

(17)
From this expression, it is understood that the shape of the integrand is fully characterized by the two parameters
and
. We rst examine the range of values which
can
or
take in practical usages. Since
, it consists of the element parameters , , , and
. Table I summarizes the ranges of the element parameters
that may cover almost all practical usages. From these values,
the double logarithmic approximation being applied should give

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 1, JANUARY 2005

TABLE I
PRACTICAL RANGES OF PARAMETER VALUES

good accuracy in the range

malized by , the range for

. If this is noris obtained

(18)

Next, we look at the other parameter

. From the terms
and
appearing in (17), a value of
makes sense only when it is compared to that of
.
Therefore, if is dened as
(19)
it can be used for representing the variation of
with respect
to
considering the common factor
. Since can be
very small or very large compared with , we should consider
the entire range of
(20)

D. Additional Variable
are sampled at a logarithmically
One-hundred points of
equidistant interval in the range (18), and the integral in (2) is
evaluated at these points by the numerical integration scheme
described in Appendix C. In this paper, the results obtained by the
numerical integration scheme are considered to be exact values.
is also calculated at the same samples of using the double
logarithmic approximation (9), where a value of
is given
and corresponding values of , , and are determined using
(10), (13), and (16). Since (10), (13), and (16) to be solved are
nonlinear, the algorithm described in Appendix D is used. Fig. 2
and
. These
plots the calculated values of when
parameter values of and are chosen just for an example.
Fig. 2(a) compares the variations with respect to of
obtained by the numerical integration and the double logarithmic
approximation, and Fig. 2(b) shows the corresponding deviation
of the approximated from the exact values. In the same way,
.
Fig. 2(c) and (d) shows the variations and the deviation of
If a maximum error is dened as the maximum absolute value
of the complex deviation of in the range (18), the maximum
error in the case of Fig. 2 is calculated to be 0.0146. Fig. 3 shows
the maximum-error versus curves for the following values of
: from 0 to 85 at an interval of 5 (in degrees). The entire range

Fig. 2. (a) Variations with respect to

of RefI g obtained by the numerical
integration and the double logarithmic approximation. (b) Real-part deviation of
the approximated values from the exact ones. (c) Variations of ImfI g obtained
by the numerical integration and the double logarithmic approximation. (d)
Imaginary-part deviation of the approximated values from the exact ones.

of is shown in Fig. 3(a), and the vicinity of the values of that

minimize the maximum errors is magnied in Fig. 3(b). If these
values of that minimize the maximum errors are traced with
respect to , the result shown by open circles in Fig. 4(a) is obtained (the corresponding values of , , and are also shown
by open circles in the gure). The result is obtained by the minimax approximation subroutine fminmax of MATLABs Optimization Toolbox [12]. The subroutine fminmax basically
uses the sequential quadratic programming algorithm proposed
in [13] and some improvements are made as described in [12].
The open circles in Fig. 4(b) show the maximum error values
with respect to as a result of the minimax approximations.

NODA: DOUBLE LOGARITHMIC APPROXIMATION OF CARSONS GROUND-RETURN IMPEDANCE

475

Fig. 3. (a) Maximum-error versus A curves for the values of  , from 0 to 85

at an interval of 5 (all in degrees). (b) The vicinity of the values of A that give
the minimum values of the maximum errors is magnied.

We have derived the conditions (13) and (16) for matching

the values at 0 and innite frequencies. If they are satised,
of course, perfect matches at 0 and innite frequencies are
achieved. However, too strict conditions may deteriorate the
accuracy at frequencies between the two extremes. It is found
that omitting (13) gives improved accuracy. The values of
that minimize the maximum errors without (13) and the
corresponding values of , , and are shown by the solid
circles in Fig. 4(a). In Fig. 4(b), the maximum error values with
respect to obtained without (13) are superimposed by the solid
circles, and better accuracy is conrmed in comparison with
those with (13). The result without (13) is also obtained by the
minimax approximation subroutine fminmax of MATLABs
Optimization Toolbox. Since the result without (13) is more
accurate, we use it hereafter.
We incorporate as the additional variable in the proposed
formula in order to represent the variations with respect to of
the optimum values of the parameters , , , and . We have
the four parameters to be determined, and the two analytical
conditions (10) and (16) are available. Thus, two parameters,
out of the four, have to be expressed as functions of , using the
minimax approximation result. Since simple forms are preferable, and are expressed by the piecewise linear curves

Fig. 4. (a) Values of A that minimize the maximum errors with respect to  .
The corresponding values of B , , and  are also superimposed. (b) Comparison
of the maximum-error versus  curves with and without the condition (13). (c)
Piecewise linear approximations of A and  with respect to  by (21) and (22).
In (a) and (b), the open and the solid circles, respectively, show the results with
and without the condition (13).

where the coefcients are identied by least-squares ttings.

The tting results are shown in Fig. 4(c). From (10) and (16),
the values of and are determined
(23)
(24)
E. Final Form
The following is the nal form of the derived formula:

(21)
(22)

(25)

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 1, JANUARY 2005

Fig. 6. Comparison of the impedance values obtained by the proposed formula

with exact values. (a) Resistive component. (b) Inductive component.
Fig. 5. (a) Single complex ground-return plane. (b) A pair of complex
ground-return planes.

where

To obtain self impedance, substitute

the return current below the ground surface. This concept can
also be applied to the proposed double logarithmic formula (25).
Compared with (4), (25) consists of two terms. The rst term
represents a component of the ground-return current owing on
the complex return plane placed at , and the second term, the
rest of the ground-return current owing on the other complex
return plane placed at . The total ground-return current is
distributed into the two complex return planes in the ratio of
to
. This is illustrated in Fig. 5(b). It should be noted that
the proposed double logarithmic formula gives better accuracy
than the single logarithmic formula by using a pair of complex
ground-return planes, rather than one, for better approximation
of current distribution below the ground surface. The current
distribution can be represented by a pair of image conductors
dened by the complex ground-return planes.
V. NUMERICAL EXAMPLES
A. Distribution Line

To obtain mutual impedance, substitute

IV. PAIR OF COMPLEX GROUND-RETURN PLANES

According to Deri et al., the single logarithmic formula (4)
can be graphically interpreted as the concept of a complex
ground-return plane which is a perfectly-conducting return
plane placed below the ground surface at a complex depth
equal to in (5) [7]. This is illustrated in Fig. 5(a), where
the ground-return current is assumed to ow on the complex
ground-return plane, instead of considering the distribution of

A typical distribution line conguration, a conductor with radius

cm placed at a height of 10 m, is used for numerically validating the proposed formula. The ground resistivity is
assumed to be 100 m. The self-impedance values with respect
to frequency are calculated by the proposed formula, and they
are compared in Fig. 6 with exact values obtained by the numerical integration scheme described in Appendix C. Since the
two curves agree well with each other, their difference cannot
be distinguished in the gure.
By considering another conductor with the same radius and
the same height, mutual impedance values are calculated and
compared with the exact ones. The value of is varied from 0
to 80 at an interval of 10 for varying the horizontal separation
of the two conductors, and the relative error, dened as
relative error

(26)

NODA: DOUBLE LOGARITHMIC APPROXIMATION OF CARSONS GROUND-RETURN IMPEDANCE

Fig. 7. Distribution line case. (a) Relative error versus frequency curves of the
proposed formula for different values of  . (b) Relative error versus frequency
curves of Pizarros formula for different values of  . In (a) and (b), the numbers
are the values of  in degrees. (c) Maximum relative error versus  curves of the
proposed and Pizarros formulas.

with respect to frequency is calculated for each value of , where

is the exact impedance value and
is the impedance value
obtained by the proposed formula. The obtained relative error
curves are plotted in Fig. 7(a). In the same way, the relative
error curves obtained by Pizarros formula (6) are plotted in
Fig. 7(b). In comparison of Fig. 7(a) and (b), it is clear that
the proposed formula is more accurate than Pizarros formula.
Fig. 7(c), which compares the maximum relative error versus
curves of the proposed and Pizarros formulas, shows that
the proposed formula is superior compared with Pizarros especially when is small. This is very important since in most
practical congurations, is small.

477

Fig. 8. Transmission-line case. (a) Relative error versus frequency curves

of the proposed formula for different values of  . (b) Relative error versus
frequency curves of Pizarros formula for different values of  . In (a) and (b),
the numbers are the values of  in degrees. (c) Maximum relative error versus
 curves of the proposed and Pizarros formulas.

B. Transmission Line
For numerical validation of the proposed formula, another
example, a 500-kV transmission-line conguration is used. In
the conguration, a bundle of six TACSR 410 conductors is
placed at a height of 50 m. The equivalent radius of the conductor bundle is calculated to be 41.8 cm using the concept of
geometrical mean distance (GMD), and the conductor bundle
is represented by a single conductor with the equivalent radius.
The ground resistivity is assumed to be 100 m.
The same calculations as the previous distribution line case
are carried out for this transmission-line case. The results are
shown in Fig. 8. A similar result to the distribution line case

478

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 1, JANUARY 2005

depths. Using practical examples, it has been conrmed that the

proposed formula gives better accuracy compared with other
existing approximate formulas.
APPENDIX A
DERIVATIONS OF (11) AND (12)
When the argument of Struves function of the rst order
approaches zero, using the power series shown in [14,
eq. 12.1.5] the following asymptotic form is obtained:
(27)
Fig. 9. Maximum relative error versus  curves of the proposed, Pizarros,
Alvarados, and the single logarithmic formulas for the distribution line case.

In the case of Bessels function of the second kind and the rst
, the power series in [14, eq. 9.1.11] gives the asymporder
totic form for
(28)
Substituting (27) and (28) into (7), gives (11).
Algebraic manipulations of (9) lead to

(29)
and if
and
obtained.

in the equation above approach zero, (12) is

Fig. 10. Maximum relative error versus  curves of the proposed, Pizarros,
Alvarados, and the single logarithmic formulas for the transmission-line case.

APPENDIX B
DERIVATIONS OF (14) AND (15)

is obtained, and we can conclude that the proposed formula is

more accurate than Pizarros one, especially when is small.

for a large
Using the asymptotic expansion of
argument [14, eq. 12.1.31], the following asymptotic form for
is obtained
(30)

C. Comparison With Other Formulas

The single logarithmic formula (4) has been widely used. Alvarado and Betancourt proposed a correction term to (4) [9].
Thus, the results obtained in the two cases above are compared
with those by the single logarithmic formula and Alvarados
one. Figs. 9 and 10 show the comparison, where the results by
Pizarros formula are also superimposed. Especially, when is
small (i.e., in practical situations), the proposed formula shows
improved accuracy compared to the other formulas.

Substituting this into (7) gives (14).

Algebraic manipulations of (9) lead to

(31)
Since

and

approach
(32)

VI. CONCLUSION
This paper has proposed a simple closed-form formula
of the ground-return impedance of horizontal parallel wires
above a lossy ground plane by applying a double logarithmic
approximation to the integral term in Carsons ground-return
impedance expression. The proposed double logarithmic approximation gives a better accuracy compared with the similar
one proposed by Pizarro and Eriksson. This has been achieved
by determining the coefcients in the double logarithmic formula using an advanced optimization technique and also by
incorporating an additional variable which minimizes errors.
In this paper, it has been shown that the double logarithmic
approximation can be graphically interpreted as a pair of
perfectly-conducting return planes placed at different complex

Substituting this into (31) gives (15).

APPENDIX C
NUMERICAL INTEGRATION SCHEME TO EVALUATE (2)
Since the interval of (2) is semi-innite, the truncation error
is rst evaluated. When the higher bound of the integration in, the truncated part of the integral
terval is truncated at
should roughly be smaller than

(33)

NODA: DOUBLE LOGARITHMIC APPROXIMATION OF CARSONS GROUND-RETURN IMPEDANCE

Assume that the relative-error tolerance

and evaluate
with

is given. We start

(34)
using an adaptive Gauss/Lobatto quadrature rule [15] with (the
becomes
quadl subroutine of Matlab is used). Until
,
is increased by ten times and (34) is
smaller than
re-evaluated. Since (33) is a rough estimation,
is used rather
than . In fact, the adaptive Gauss/Lobatto quadrature rule requires an absolute tolerance rather than a relative one, and abcalculated
solute tolerance is obtained by multiplying by
at the previous iteration step.
.
In this paper, all calculations are carried out with
APPENDIX D
ALGORITHM TO SOLVE (10), (13), AND (16)
Substituting (10) and (16) into (13) gives
(35)
For a given value of , the equation above is solved by the
NetwonRaphson algorithm.
REFERENCES
[1] J. R. Carson, Wave propagation in overhead wires with ground return,
Bell Syst. Tech. J., vol. 5, pp. 539554, 1926.
[2] F. Pollaczek, Uber das Feld einer unendlich langen wechselstromdurchossenen Einfachleitung, E.N.T., Band 3 (Heft 9), pp. 339360, 1926.
[3] P. C. Magnusson, G. C. Alexander, V. K. Tripathi, and A. Weisshaar,
Transmission Lines and Wave Propagation, 4th ed. Boca Raton, FL:
CRC, 2001.
[4] E. D. Sunde, Earth Conduction Effects in Transmission Systems. New
York: Van Nostrand, 1949.
[5] J. R. Wait and K. P. Spies, On the image representation of the quasistatic
elds of a line current source above the ground, Can. J. Phys., vol. 47,
pp. 27312733, 1969.

479

[6] C. Gary, Approche complte de la propagation multilaire en haute

frquence par utilization des matrices complexes, EDF Bull. Direction
tudes Recherches B, no. 3/4, pp. 520, 1976.
[7] A. Deri, G. Tevan, A. Semlyen, and A. Castanheira, The complex ground return plane, a simplied model for homogeneous and
multi-layer earth return, IEEE Trans. Power App. Syst., vol. PAS-100,
no. 8, pp. 36863693, Aug. 1981.
[8] P. Pettersson, Image representation of wave propagation on wires
above, on and under ground, IEEE Trans. Power Del., vol. 9, no. 2, pp.
10491055, Apr. 1994.
[9] F. L. Alvarado and R. Betancourt, An accurate closed-form approximation for ground return impedance calculations, Proc. IEEE, vol. 71, pp.
279280, Feb. 1983.
[10] M. Pizarro and R. Eriksson, Modeling of the ground mode of transmission lines in time domain simulations, in Proc. 7th ISH, Dresden,
Germany, 1991, pp. 179182.
[11] M. Pizarro, Modeling Frequency Dependent Line Parameters for Time
Domain Simulation of Transients in Power Systems, Lic. Tek., Royal
Inst. Technol., Stockholm, Sweden, 1991.
[12] T. Coleman, M. A. Branch, and A. Grace, Optimization Toolbox Users
Guide (Version 2), 3rd ed. Natick, MA: The MathWorks, Inc., 1999.
[13] R. K. Brayton, S. W. Director, G. D. Hachtel, and L. Vidigal, A new
algorithm for statistical circuit design based on quasi-Newton methods
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pp. 784794, Sep. 1979.
[14] M. Abramowitz and I. A. Stegun, Handbook of Mathematical Functions,
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[15] W. Gander and W. Gautschi, Adaptive quadratureRevisited, BIT
Numer. Math., vol. 40, pp. 84101, 2000.

Taku Noda (M97) was born in Osaka, Japan,

in 1969. He received the B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D.
degrees in engineering from Doshisha University,
Kyoto, Japan, in 1992, 1994, and 1997, respectively.
Currently, he is a Research Scientist with the
Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry
(CRIEPI), where he has been since 1997. From 2001
to 2002, he was a Visiting Scientist at the University
of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada. He also serves as
an Adjunct Professor at Doshisha University, Kyoto,
Japan. His primary research interest is the transient
analysis of power systems.
Dr. Noda is a member of the IEE (U.K.) and the IEE of Japan.