Solid Dielectric Reclosers Offer a More Enviromentally Friendly Product are they Safer Longer Life Products?

Today's electricity utilities are challenged with achieving greater performance and reliability levels than ever before, generally with fewer resources available to them. Use of modem auto reclosers with intelligent electronic device (IED) controllers is one of the most effective tools available to today's utility engineer to increase overhead network performance. The challenge for auto recloser manufacturers is to produce equipment that is faster, more accurate, offers better reliability and is easier to adapt into existing systems than previous generations of equipment. Application of the latest in single coil magnetic actuator and vacuum interrupter technology allows simplification of mechanism design to provide greater lifetime and reliability while increasing speed of operation. Simpler mechanisms combined with use of appropriate current and voltage sensing technologies, such as Rogowski sensors and capacitively coupled voltage measurement techniques, permit today's recloser manufacturers to reduce size and weight while increasing the effectiveness of reclosers in overhead network automation and protection schemes. Application of advances in microprocessor technology offer energy efficient, fast and accurate sampling of analogue values, flexible protection features and remote terminal unit (RTU) functionality to meet the increasing requirements placed on today's IED's. Solid dielectric insulation products are offered by most manufacturers today. Most of these products do not offer arc fault containment and venting in the tank. This paper questions whether this type of product is really a safer long life alternative and offers an alternative approach