Patent ID: 7272515

Claim:
A processing apparatus for determining the occurrence of a high impedance fault in an electrical power line comprising: two buffers each for storing data collected from said power line for a first predetermined period of time indicative of current flow on said power line; a plurality of high impedance fault detection means for individually detecting a high impedance fault on said power line, each of said high impedance fault detection means having an output and alternately processing for said first predetermined period of time said data stored in one of said two buffers and then said data stored in the other of said two buffers, each of said high impedance fault detection means providing at said output a signal based on said processed data indicative of the occurrence or non-occurrence of said high impedance fault; and a circular buffering system connected to said output of each of said high impedance fault detection means for producing an output signal indicative of the occurrence or non-occurrence of said high impedance fault that is based on said data collected for a second predetermined period of time that is n times said first predetermined period of time where n is an integer that is two or greater.