DIFFERENT CHARACTERISTICS OF SEMICONDUCTING GLAZED

INSULATORS AT ARTIFICIALLY POLLUTED CONDITIONS

Ghasem Ahrabian1, Farhad Shahnia2, Amin Lafzi3

1,3
Faculty of Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Tabriz, Tabriz, Iran
2
Eastern Azarbayjan Electric Power Distribution Company, Tabriz, Iran
1
ahrabian@tabrizu.ac.ir, 2shahnia@tabrizu.ac.ir, 3amin_lafzi@yahoo.com

Abstract-Semiconducting Glazed Insulators are one of evaporation of the insulator surface and prevents local
the most efficiently used insulators in contaminant areas. discharges to happen. Uniform potential distribution on
Several electrical and mechanical tests take place under SGI string is more monotonous than ordinary porcelain
electrical and mechanical rests are carried out to foresee insulators.
the operation of these insulators in regions with high
pollution. In attention to plenty of such tests that each one II. SGI STRUCTURE
is being tested with a special way and different electrical, The structure of SGIs is the same as ordinary porcelain
mechanical and environmental specifications, adding the insulators but the most important difference is in their
results up and analyzing them has a special importance. In glaze. SGIs contain tin-oxide and amount of antimony
this paper, comparing the operation of this kind of with the other additive of niobium-oxide in ordinary glaze
insulators with conventional porcelain insulators in base. This additive was found effective to improve
different artificially polluted conditions and related performance against glaze corrosion. In addition to the
indexes in determining the operation of these insulators in capacitance specification of SGI which is the same as the
different conditions of pollution is achieved. other insulators, SGIs have little conducting characteristic
Keywords-Semiconducting Glazed Insulators, Withstand in their surface because of semiconducting glaze layer
voltage, Flashover, Leakage current, Test existence, meanwhile because of high surface impedance
of conventional insulators, such a conductance in their
I. INTRODUCTION layer is not seen. In Fig. 1 the schematic structure of a
Application of different kinds of insulators is based on SGI is presented where their differences with ordinary
different electrical, mechanical and economical porcelain insulators are shown in Fig. 2.
conditions. The most important point which should be
considered about insulators is the pollution effect on their
operation according to the different environments. Most
of insulators are used outdoors and the environment
pollutions can cause their surface to be covered with dust
or chemical materials in long time. In wet environments
pollution causes reduction in surface impedance of the
insulators by dissolving in water and dispersing on the
whole surface of the insulators. Nowadays,
Semiconducting Glazed Insulators (SGI) are being used
Fig. 1. Structure of SGI.
accompanied by porcelain insulators in large amount
while the results of their tests and experimental studies
show the priority of SGI in comparison with others,
especially in highly polluted areas. All over the world,
different laboratories are conducting tests that each one
takes place with a special method and for different
polluted environments, where adding these results up has
a special importance. The main ability of SGI in facing
with negative effects of pollution and humidity is surface
drying effect. Existence of surface conducting in
insulator’s glaze ends to leakage current in mA range and
Fig. 2. Schematic image of ordinary porcelain insulator (right) and glazed
increasing its temperature to some degrees more than the porcelain insulator (left).
ambient temperature. Insulator heating cause humidity
The application of SGI s is greatly suggested for areas So with comparison for different values of salt deposit
with high pollution and humidity. The leakage current on density on different insulator surfaces, better operation of
the surface of convectional insulators flows on its surface these insulators can be found out which suggests the
and the rate of it increases as pollution and humidity application of these kinds of insulators in polluted regions
increase and if on the surface of insulator there are dry with more confidence.
bands, the leakage current follows its way through the air
due to the law impedance of the air rather than the dry IV. SGI SURFACE IMPEDANCE
bands as shown in Fig. 3. In result partial discharges are When the leakage current flows on the surface of
created on the surface of insulator and their number might insulators, the generated heat will cause a decrease in the
increase resulting in a flashover on the insulator. In SGIs, surface impedance of the insulator since the thermal
the leakage current will continue its path through the coefficient of semiconductor is negative and in result
glaze of the insulator instead of flashover through the air current will increase. As this condition continues there is
which is caused because of insulator glaze low impedance probability of thermal runaway of the insulator. In order
as shown in Fig. 4. This fact prevents flashovers to to prevent this, it is better to choose high surface
happen which would end to better operation and longer impedance for insulator. But in attention to the current
life of insulators and succession in polluted and humid flow on insulator surface in order to its operation recovery
conditions. and also increase the rate of withstand voltage, it is not
possible to increase the impedance value so high,
therefore the optimum value should be chosen which is
about 13 ± 5 MΩ. In this case the leakage current value
would be about 0.5-1 mA on the SGI surface. Therefore
the withstand voltage variation of SGI with insulator
surface impedance is as shown in Fig. 7.

Fig. 3. Leakage current flow on the surface of contaminated ordinary porcelain

insulators.

Fig. 6. SGI withstand voltage variation with insulator surface impedance.

Due to the surface impedance of the insulator, the leakage

current flow on insulator surface will cause fatalities on
its surface which result in an increase in insulator
temperature in comparison with ambient temperature
Fig. 4. Leakage current flow on the surface of contaminated SGI. which is transferred to environment as heat. With an
increase in impedance, leakage current on the surface of
III. SGI WITHSTAND VOLTAGE SGI decreases. This fact causes an increase in thermal
The results of different tests on the conventional porcelain stability of the insulator. Thermal runaway of withstand
insulators and SGIs prove the fact that SGIs have about 3 voltage will increase because the surface impedance is
times higher impedance in comparison with ordinary high. In fact, withstand voltage value will decrease.
porcelain insulators which will decrease to 2 times in Therefore, these two characteristics will determine the
heavy humid conditions as shown in Fig. 5. optimum impedance. But the main parameter is the
thermal runaway of withstand voltage. Because withstand
voltage of SGI is higher than ordinary porcelain insulators
under the pollution condition. Fig. 8 shows the SGI
thermal runaway of withstand voltage with insulators
surface impedance variations which increases with an
increase in impedance value.

Fig. 5. Contamination withstand voltage of SGI.

Fig. 7. SGI thermal runaway withstand voltage with insulator surface impedance. Fig 10. Influence of the absolute humidity on the flashover voltage of SGI and
ordinary porcelain insulator.
V. SGI FLASHOVER VOLTAGE
In order to study and analyze the flashover voltage in Flashover voltages created by lightening impulse stress in
SGIs several tests in the field of switching and lightning conventional porcelain insulators and SGI for different
impulse stress are done on these insulators. temperatures in terms of humidity changes are shown in
As shown in Fig. 8, flashover voltage variations of Fig. 11. As shown in this figure, the flashover voltage
ordinary porcelain with environmental humidity are linear value for an environment with constant temperature and
which for a definite humidity, the flashover voltage rate humidity is higher for porcelain insulator with
increases with temperature increase. But in SGIs a semiconducting glaze than the same value for ordinary
different behavior in different humidity is visible, as ones.
shown in Fig. 9 where in 10˚c and 20˚c the flashover
voltage decreases as humidity increases. But in 30˚c and
40˚c the flashover voltage increases as humidity increases.

Fig 8. Ordinary porcelain flashover voltage variations with absolute humidity at

different temperatures.

Fig. 11. Flashover voltage variations with absolute humidity for different
temperatures for ordinary porcelain insulator (top) and SGI (bottom).

Also in Fig. 12, the flashover voltage by lightening

impulse stress of these two insulators are shown which
proves mentions the fact that in humidity above of 37
g/m3, the flashover voltage of conventional glazed
insulator is more than SGIs.
Fig 9. SGI flashover voltage variations with absolute humidity at different
temperatures.

Also comparing ordinary porcelain insulators and SGIs

for a definite temperature, this major result is obtained
that in low humidity for SGIs, flashover voltage value
created by the switching impulse stresses is more than the
same value for conventional insulators. But for very high
amount of humidity (above 45 g/m3) flashover voltage
value created by switching impulse stress for SGIs is less
than the same value for conventional insulators which is Fig. 12. Flashover voltage variations with absolute humidity of a SGI and ordinary
porcelain insulator.
shown in Fig. 10.
 VI. SGI POTENTIAL DISTRIBUTION
Equivalent circuit of SGI string is shown in Fig. 13 which
contains series connection of capacitors (capacitance
characteristic of each insulator) and impedance (insulator
surface electrical impedance). In each insulator string
capacitance between the insulator units and conductor and
insulator units and tower is effective in addition to
capacitance of each insulator and in other words potential
distribution along an insulator string formed by insulator
units is not uniformed because of leakage capacitors. In
result, voltage drop on the line side units is more than the
Fig. 15. Value of the potential at the tips of the sheds for different frequency of the
other units. This problem has decreased in SGIs, because driving voltage.
in insulator strings formed by SGI unit, voltage
distribution is more uniform than previous conditions In Fig. 16 voltage distribution on the surface of SGI,
because of low surface impedance voltage. This has lead effect of lightening voltage wave on insulation string in
to the ability of decreasing the length of insulator string in several frequencies is visible. As you see for low
the same conditions with ordinary porcelain. In addition frequencies, in attention to the conductance of insulator
this can also be greatly effective on decreasing the semiconductor, voltage distributions show ohmic
probability of corona discharge. characteristics. But for high frequencies voltage
distributions have capacitance behavior. Also the voltage
distributions in 7 units of SGIs for several frequencies of
lightening impulse voltage stress are shown in Fig. 17.

Fig. 13. Equivalent circuit of SGI string.

Fig. 16. Potential distribution along a SGI for different frequencies of the driving
Voltage distribution of a 7 unit insulator string which has voltage.
semiconductor glaze with the equivalent circuit of Fig. 13
for different switching impulse stresses is shown in
Figures 14 and 15. As it is visible, for frequencies less
than 1 kHz, the ohmic component of the voltage is prior
but for frequencies higher than 10 kHz, voltage potential
is capacitive. And so it is almost equal with voltage
distribution in conventional porcelain insulators.

Fig. 17. Frequency response for the tip of each insulator shed for a driving voltage.

In order to make voltage distribution more linear on the

insulator string, we can increase conductance of insulator
semiconductor glaze 4 to 10 times, which causes an
increase in surface leakage current of insulator 4 to 10
times. This increase in leakage current creates thermal
instability problems in insulator, but as mentioned before
Fig. 14. Measured and calculated potential distribution for different voltage
an increase in value of insulator glaze conductance causes
shapes. voltage distribution more linear in the insulator string and
also increase in value of flashover voltage which is visible
in Fig. 18.
 VIII. REFERENCES
[1] S. Matsuni, Y. Nakashima, F. Kasaki, O. Fujii, E.
Matsuda, "State of the art of semiconducting glazed
insulators for transmission lines in heavily
contaminated area", Proc. of 5th IEEE Int. Conf. on
Properties and Application of Dielectric Materials,
May 1997, Korea.
[2] A. Shinoda, H. Okada, M. Nakagami, Y. Suzuki, S.
Ito, M. Akizuki, "Development of high resistance
semiconducting glazed insulators", IEEE Power
Engineering Society General Meeting, pp. 556-562,
June 2005.
Fig. 18. Potential distribution along a SGI for different layer conductivities.
[3] O. Elsaser, K. Feser, "Flashover behavior of
semiconducting glazed insulators under positive
switching impulse stress at different climate
conditions", IEEE Int. conf. on Electrical Insulation
and Dielectric Phenomena, pp. 711-714, 1999.
[4] O.Elsaser, K. Feser, F. Messerer, "Flashover behavior
VII. CONCLUSION
of semiconducting glazed insulators under positive
Application of SGIs in highly polluted areas has been
lightning impulse stress at different climate conditions",
increase in the last few years in comparison with ordinary
IEEE Int. conf. on Electrical Insulation and Dielectric
porcelain insulators and their application is highly
Phenomena, pp. 203-206, 2000.
recommended for the areas with high temperature and
[5] Y. Mizuno, K. Naito, "Voltage and temperature
humidity. These insulators have higher flashover and
distribution along semiconducting glazed insulators
withstand voltage at switching and lightning impulses and
strings", IEEE Trans. on Dielectrics and Electrical
have a more uniformed voltage distribution along the
Insulation, Vol. 6, No. 1, pp. 100-104, February 1999.
insulator string in comparison with ordinary porcelain
[6] K. Kato, S. Asaoka, T. Ikeda, "Wetting characteristics
insulators. Better materials also are being studied
of various kinds of insulator", Proc. of 6th IEEE Int.
nowadays for being used in their glaze so that their
Conf. on Properties and Application of Dielectric
characteristics are improved at polluted areas.
Materials, June 2000, China.