Protecting the Broadcasting Plant: A Critical Look at Accepted Electrical Grounding Techniques

摘要

This paper explores the position that traditionalgrounding design, as used in the broadcasting business (andnearly all others), has not kept pace with electronictechnology in common use today. Furthermore, themethodology used to create traditional grounding is overlyassumption-driven, resulting in inaccurate, often fullyinsufficient or unstable grounding strategies. What hassufficed as suitable grounding in the past, simply doesn’t fitwell with the sensitivity (and expense) of broadcastingfacilities and equipment now deployed. The increasing costsand frequency of losses being incurred by broadcastingoperations due to lightning and other electrical-relateddamage are clear evidence of the shortcomings of traditionalground rod arrays and accepted analytical techniques.Therefore, changing the way grounding solutions areenvisioned and applied appears to be imminently necessary.