Patent ID: 7965477

Claim:
An electrical wiring protection device comprising: a housing assembly including a plurality of line terminals and a plurality of load terminals; a fault detection circuit coupled to at least one of the plurality of line terminals and configured to generate a fault detection signal in response to detecting at least one fault condition in the electrical distribution system; a circuit interrupter coupled to the fault detection circuit, the circuit interrupter being configured to couple the plurality of line terminals to the plurality of load terminals to form a conductive electrical path in a reset state, and decouple the plurality of line terminals from the plurality of load terminals in response to the fault detection signal in a tripped state; and a voltage transient suppression circuit coupled to at least one of the plurality of line terminals, the voltage transient suppression circuit including a movistor configured to conduct a leakage current in the event of a movistor failure, the leakage current simulating the at least one fault condition when the magnitude of the leakage current exceeds a predetermined value such that the circuit interrupter is driven into the tripped state, the leakage current not propagating through the conductive electrical path.