Research on Pollution Agglomeration Characteristics of Insulator in DC Electric Field

The pollution flashover, one of the most serious accidents in the power industry, poses a significant threat to the safety and stability of power systems. Especially for UHV DC transmission lines, which are more vulnerable to this phenomenon. The contamination characteristics of insulator on the UHV DC transmission lines have always been the main research problem for engineers and experts. However, most of the researches are aimed at the macro pollution characteristics. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the micro pollution characteristics of insulator in electric field, which can complement the existing pollution theory. In this paper, a natural system for accumulating pollution was established and utilized to examine the micro surface features of insulator under different conditions. A different electric field environment or whether charged cases on micro pollution characteristics of insulator were researched. The experimental results indicate that the distribution of surface pollution on DC charged and electrically neutral insulators takes the form of chain and granular shapes, respectively. This suggests that the agglomeration characteristics of pollution are significantly influenced by the DC electric field.