Growing Demand for Testing DC Cables & Accessories: Experience & Special New Requirements

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High-voltage direct-current (HVDC) technology is a growing field in the T&D sector, allowing transmission of bulk quantities of energy with a reduced impact on Infrastructures and reduced losses. The performance level of today’s HVDC solutions allows to gain advantage from technical, economic and environmental points of view. HVDC power transmission becomes more and more competitive compared to AC transmission especially over long distances .
These are the main reasons why HVDC is seen as the backbone for what some experts and politicians have named the “super grid” or a high-capacity transmission network for efficiently moving electrical energy to load centers. In Germany the wind energy parks at the North Sea coast need a connection to the energy consuming industry in the South. At the same time the acceptance of new overhead transmission lines decreases more and more. Therefore, space saving solutions and T&D technologies with high efficiencies are required, e.g. so called hybrid solutions with AC and DC overhead lines on a common tower. Where such solutions are not possible the request for laying cables is increasing and therefore it is essential to provide testing solutions to the manufacturers and the utilities. This paper gives an overview about testing of extruded cables for DC application.​