Numerical Simulations of Temperature Stability Limits in High-Voltage Direct Current Cable Insulations.

The high-voltage direct current cable insulations consist of polymeric or mass-impregnated paper materials. Their electric conductivities depend on the electric field and the temperature. Losses inside the conductor and in the insulation increase the temperature, resulting in increased losses and in a possible thermal runaway process. In this paper, coupled electro-thermal field simulations including nonlinear field-dependent conductivities are carried out. With a varying applied voltage and a current in the conductor, the condition for a thermal breakdown is computed. To compute the losses inside a 1-D insulation model, the finite-difference method is used. The simulation results conform well to experimental measurements. An approximation of the condition for a thermal breakdown is developed and show equal results in comparison to the coupled electro-thermal field simulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]