Modeling a liquid-solid insulation system used in a DC wet-mate connector

Subsea DC transmission and distribution system is a promising technology for powering subsea oil and gas fields with high power, long distance and ultra-deepwater depth. DC connectors as the interface between cables and electrical power component and loads in such a system play a key role. An electrodynamic model is developed in this paper to study charge transport phenomena in a DC wet-mate subsea connector. The oil-solid insulation system of WM chamber contains synthetic transformer oil enclosed by dielectric solid and the electrodes covered by dielectric solid. This complicated hybrid insulation system placed in a cylindrical electrode geometry is simulated in this paper. It is shown that the oil can be susceptible to the streamer initiation and development. Moreover, it will be discussed that the free space charge carriers traveled to the interface between the oil and dielectric solid and converted to the surface charges may increase the electric field magnitude across the dielectric solid.