Space charge is a threat to insulation materials and oil-paper insulation gradually degrades in service. The degradation of cellulose affects space charge formation, accumulation and dissipation, and the presence of space charge affects the performance of dielectric. In this paper, the effect of thermal aging on space charge behaviors and other properties including permittivity, conductivity, and tensile strength was investigated. Oil-paper samples were aged at a hot spot temperature (180℃). During thermal aging, space charge distribution was measured at a regular interval at room temperature. And the pulse electro-acoustic (PEA) method was used for space charge measurement. The results showed that the thermal aging at hot spot temperature caused increase of conductivity and tensile strength degradation. The permittivity increased at the beginning but then it decreased, while dissipation factor showed an upward trend. Besides these, trap distribution and carriers characteristics were also affected. The formations of space charge of unaged and aged oil paper were consequently different under low electric field. Due to the generation of traps by the degradation of cellulose, more charge, especially positive charge was trapped, but the increased traps mostly were shallow traps. Based on the Schottky model, a correlation between space charge injection and the permittivity was drawn. This, together with the appearance of positive bulk charge could be used for oil paper aging status diagnosis.

No abstract

Space charge has received much attention recently because an understanding of space charge in oil-paper insulation is useful for the design of converter transformers. This paper presents a study of space charge dynamics at the physical interface using the pulsed electroacoustic (PEA) method. After sample inversion, space charge in the vicinity of semiconductor electrode could be clearly observed when the sample is under depolarization. When an unexposed sample was placed next to a previously polarized one, negative charge appeared at the dielectric interface. These results indicated that there were other reasons in addition to acoustic loss that led to space charge distribution distortion. As regards the dielectric interface, it was found that an electrical double layer was formed at the interface, and the space charge sign was dependent upon the polarity of applied voltage. Space charge behavior at the interface depended on several aspects of the status of the interface, and during voltage polarity reversal, the interface was a weak point of the insulation.Index Terms -Space charge, interface, pulsed electroacoustic method, oil-paper insulation, polarity reversal voltage.

This study explores the possibility of enhancing both mechanical and breakdown properties of insulating presspaper by the introduction of an organic nano additive. Four different concentrations of nanofibrillated cellulose (NFC) were taken into account: 0.5 wt %, 2.5 wt %, 5 wt %, and 10 wt %. Presspaper containing no NFC was also prepared as a reference. Obtained samples were characterized by scanning electron microscope (SEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Mechanical properties and breakdown behaviors were measured. Results show that the addition of 10 wt % NFC to softwood fibers can achieve the best performance. Tensile strength of reference presspaper is 109 MPa, whereas that of presspaper modified by 10 wt % NFC is 136 MPa, resulting in a 25% increase. The improved tensile strength can be attributed to the increased density and inter fiber bond strength. More importantly, presspaper reinforced by 10 wt % NFC can also achieve enhanced AC and DC breakdown strengths, which are 19% and 21% higher than those of the reference presspaper. It is concluded that NFC is likely to be a promising nano additive for cellulose insulation.

No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

Nanocellulose-modified presspaper is a promising solution to achieve cellulose insulation with better performance, reducing the risk of electrical insulation failures of a converter transformer. Predicting the dielectric properties will help to further design and improvement of presspaper. In this paper, a multivariable method was adopted to determine the effect of softwood fiber on the macroscopic performance of presspaper. Based on the parameters selected using the optimum subset method, a multiple linear regression was built to model the relationship between the fiber properties and insulating performance of presspaper. The results show that the fiber width and crystallinity had an obvious influence on the mechanical properties of presspaper, and fiber length, fines, lignin, and nanocellulose had a significant impact on the breakdown properties. The proposed models exhibit a prediction accuracy of higher than 90% when verified with the experimental results. Finally, the effect of nanocellulose on the breakdown strength of presspaper was taken into account and new models were derived.