EE451: High Voltage Engineering

Lecture 13

Farhan Mahmood, PhD

Department of Electrical Engineering
UET, Lahore

May 23, 2016

Outline

Breakdown Mechanism in Liquids

• Liquid dielectrics
• Pure liquids and commercial liquids
• Breakdown in liquid dielectrics (Electronic BD Theory)
• Breakdown in pure liquids
• Breakdown in commercial liquids

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Liquid Dielectrics

• Liquid dielectrics are used as insulating medium in transformers, arc extinguishers in

circuit breakers and impregnants in high voltage cables and capacitors.
• Oil is about 10 times more efficient than air or nitrogen in its heat transfer capability
when used in transformers.
• Liquid dielectrics are more useful as insulating materials than either solids or gases.
• This is because both liquids and solids are usually 103 times denser than gases and
hence, from Paschen's law, it should follow that they possess much higher dielectric
strength of the order of 107 V/cm.
• Liquids are expected to give very high dielectric strength of the order of 10 MV/cm,
but, in actual practice, the strengths obtained are only of the order of 100 kV/cm.

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Liquid Dielectrics

• Commonly used liquid dielectrics:

− Mineral oils
− N-hexane
− N-heptane
− Castor oils
− Silicon oils
− Liquid nitrogen

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Liquid Dielectrics

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Liquid Dielectrics

• The three most important electrical properties of liquid dielectric are:

− Dielectric strength
− Relative permittivity
− Loss tangent
• Basic properties of insulating oil:
− Viscosity
− Thermal stability
− Density and specific gravity
− Flash point
− Pour point

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Liquid Dielectrics

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Liquid Dielectrics

• Major impurities present in liquid dielectrics are:

− Fine water droplets and water vapours
− Dust
− Carbon and sulphur ions
− Dissolved gases CO2
• The presence of even 0.01% water in oil brings down the dielectric strength to 20%
of the dry oil value and the presence of fibrous impurities brings down the dielectric
strength much sharply.
• Therefore, whenever these oils are used for providing electrical insulation, these
should be free from moisture, products of oxidation and other contaminants.

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Pure Liquids and Commercial Liquids

• Pure liquids are those which are chemically pure and do not contain any other
impurity even in traces of 1 in 109 and are structurally simple.
Examples: n-hexane (C6H14), n-heptane (C7/H16) and other paraffin hydrocarbons.
• Commercial liquids which are insulating liquids like oils are not chemically pure and
may have impurities like dust particles, moisture, dissolved gases, gas bubbles, and
ionic impurities etc. These impurities reduce the breakdown strength of the liquid
dielectrics.
• When breakdown occurs in these liquids, additional gases and gas bubbles are
evolved and solid decomposition products are formed.

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Pure Liquids and Commercial Liquids

• The breakdown in pure liquids is explained by:

− Electronic breakdown theory
• Several theories have been proposed to explain the breakdown in commercial
liquids, and they are classified as follows:
− Breakdown due to solid particles (suspended particle theory)
− Breakdown due to gaseous bubbles
− Breakdown due to liquid globule

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Breakdown in Pure Liquids (Electronic BD Theory)

• Electronic breakdown theory explains the breakdown in pure liquids on a model

which is an extension of gaseous breakdown, based on the avalanche ionization of
the atoms caused by electron collision in the applied field.

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Breakdown in Pure Liquids (Electronic BD Theory)

• It has been observed that low electric field (1 kV/cm), conduction in pure liquids is
mainly ionic (due to positive and negative ions).
• At intermediate fields, the conduction saturates but at high field (100 kV/cm), the
conduction increases more rapidly and thus, breakdown takes place.
• At high fields, the current generated because of the electron emission from the
cathode gets multiplied in the liquid medium by a Townsend mechanisms. The
current multiplication also occurs from the electrons generated at the interfaces of
liquid and impurities.

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Breakdown in Pure Liquids (Electronic BD Theory)

• The electrons are assumed to be ejected from the cathode into the liquid by either a
field emission or thermionic emission. This constitutes the current at the cathode.
• However, it has been observed that breakdown measurements carried over a wide
range of temperatures, show little temperature dependence.
• It is possible that the return of positive ions and particularly positively charged foreign
particles to the cathode will cause local field enhancement and give rise to local
electron emission.
• Once an electron is injected into the liquid, it gains energy from the electric field
applied between the electrodes.
• It is assumed that some electrons will gain more energy due to field than they would
lose during collisions with the molecules.

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Breakdown in Pure Liquids (Electronic BD Theory)

• These electrons are accelerated under the electric field and would gain sufficient
energy to knock out an electron and thus, initiate avalanche.
• The threshold condition for the beginning of avalanche is achieved when the energy
gained by the electron equals the energy lost during ionization (electron emission)
and is given by,

where λ is the mean free path, hv is the energy of ionization and C is a constant.

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Breakdown in Commercial Liquids

• The impurities which lead to breakdown of liquid dielectrics are:

− Bubbles of gas: impurities having lower breakdown strength compared to liquid
− Conducting particles: impurities that result in local field enhancement in liquid
− Globules of water: impurities that are unstable in an electric field
• Several theories have been proposed to explain the breakdown in commercial
liquids, and they are classified as follows:
− Breakdown due to solid particles
− Breakdown due to gaseous bubbles
− Breakdown due to liquid globule

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Breakdown due to Solid Particles

• In commercial liquids, the presence of solid impurities cannot be avoided. These

impurities will be present as fibres or as dispersed solid particles.
• The permittivity of these particles (ε2) will be different from the permittivity of the
liquid (ε1).
• When the liquid is subjected to an electric field E, the particles will become polarize
and experience a force F,

• If permittivity of impurities (ε2) > permittivity of liquid dielectric (ε1), then the force is
directed towards the region of maximum stress.
• Thus, the force will tend the particle to move to the strongest region of the field.

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Breakdown due to Solid Particles

• In a uniform field gap or sphere gap of small spacing, the strongest field is in the
uniform region. In this region grad E is equal to zero so that the particle will remain in
equilibrium there.
• If the voltage is continuously applied (d.c) or the duration of the voltage is long (a.c),
then this force will drag the particles into the uniform field region.
• When a particle reaches either electrode, its outward tip will act as an extension to
the electrode. This will cause flux concentration in the region and other particles will
be attracted into the region.
• As the time passes, the particles align head to tail to form a bridge across the gap.
• The field in the liquid between the particles will be enhanced, and if it reaches critical
value breakdown will follow.

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Breakdown due to Solid Particles

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Breakdown due to Gaseous Bubbles

• Following processes might lead to formation of bubbles of gases in the liquids:

− Changes in temperature and pressure
− Gas pockets exist on the surface of electrodes
− Due to irregular surface of electrodes, point charge concentration may lead to
corona discharge, thus vaporizing the liquid
• The electric field in a gas bubble that is immersed in a liquid of permittivity Ɛ1 is,

where E0 is the field in the liquid dielectric in the absence of bubbles.

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Breakdown due to Gaseous Bubbles

• When the field Eb becomes equal to the limiting field for gaseous ionization, a
discharge will take place through the bubble.
• This will result in gas formation through decomposition of oil molecules and may lead
to breakdown of the gap.
• If on the electrodes there are spots at which current density is very high, at
sufficiently high fields, vaporization of the liquid may take place at these points.
• A discharge through the vapor bubble will result in formation of a stable gas volume
and may lead to breakdown when the bubble bridges the gap.

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 Breakdown due to Gaseous Bubbles

Fig. Formation of a gas bubble at a point at Fig. Gas discharge in the bubble, developing
the point of micro-roughness on the electrode in into branched streamers with ultimate
surface in an oil gap breakdown

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Breakdown due to Liquid Globule

• Consider an incompressible liquid globule of permittivity ε2 is immersed in a liquid of

permittivity ε1 and the gap is subjected to an electric field E, it will elongate in the
direction of the field, taking the shape of a prolate spheroid.
• An expression for the critical field, which causes instability in the liquid, is given for
the case where the ratio ε2 / ε1 → ∞ as,

where S = surface tension of the liquid

R = radius of the globule

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Breakdown due to Liquid Globule

• Breakdown will occur when the globule becomes unstable and elongates rapidly
reaching about two-thirds of the gap and breakdown channels developed at the end
of the globule.
• Propagation of the channels across the remaining gap result in total breakdown

Fig. Water drop being gradually elongated by electric field and ultimately causing
breakdown. The water is evaporated by discharge

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