21, rue dArtois, F-75008 PARIS http : //www.cigre.

org

B4_201_2012

CIGRE 2012

R&D progress of 1100kV UHVDC technology

Liu Zehong, Gao Liying, Wang Zuli, Yu Jun, Zhang Jin, Lu Licheng, State Grid Corporation of China China

SUMMARY
The successful construction and reliable operation of Xiangjiaba-Shanghai project fully proved the performance of 800kV UHVDC technology. Considering the huge power export of Sinkiang and Tibet area, SGCC (State Grid Corporation of China) started R&D of higher voltage level UHVDC technology on 2008. Considering the capacity and distance of power transmission, the economics of different voltage level development were evaluated as well as the feasibility of key equipments. On the end of 2010, several key parameters are decided. For the 10,000MW power transmission over 2350kM or longer, the selected rated voltage is 1100kV, and rated current is 4750A with capacity 10,450MW. In addition, the R&D schedule is presented. In this paper, the current R&D progress and the scheduled study of 1100kV UHVDC are presented. The content is organized into six parts. In part I, the basics and operation status of Xiangjiaba-Shanghai project is given. Then, the demand of 1100kV project is introduced, as well as pilot project. In part II, the R&D progress of key technology is given. Main circuit scheme and the technical specification of equipments are introduced. The main circuit configuration is same with Xiangjiaba project. The two series converter scheme is connected with equivalent voltage distribution in one pole. By optimizing the configuration and parameters of surge arresters, the over-voltage level is suppressed deeply including AC side and valve side of transformer, critical points in DC circuit, etc. The insulation level is also proposed. The study of external insulation and electromagnetic environment, are presented, which have significant impact on the project construction cost. The length of insulators and air clearance are proposed., In third part, the R&D progress of key equipment is introduced. Firstly, the crucial points of all DC equipments are reviewed, and give possible solution. Secondly, the roadmap and technical solution of converter transformer and wall bushing is discussed , In part IV, the scheme of converter transformer on-site assembling is proposed. Due to the transportation limit, it is impossible to transport the whole transformer to Sinkiang area by railway or road. Then, the on-site assembling idea is proposed and studied. In the scheme, the high-end valve hall of pole II is used for transformer assembling. The current technical solutions are introduced including manufacture, fault treatment and test. In addition, the preliminary manufacture and test equipment layout in valve hall is also given. Then, this paper discusses the key points in the solution, and ideas. In part V, the R&D of next step is presented.

KEYWORDS
1100kV, Ultra HVDC, Wall bushing, Converter transformer, On-site assembling.

1. Introduction 1.1 Success of 800 kV UHVDC technology On July 8th, 2010, XJB-Shanghai 800 kV UHVDC demonstration project is put into operation. This Pilot Project deliveries the hydro power of Southwest China. The project originates from Fulong site in Yibin city, Sichuan province, and terminates at Fengxian site, Shanghai. On the route, there are 8 provinces and municipalities including SichuanChongqingHubeiHunanAnhuiZhejiang Jiangsu and Shanghai, and 4 long spans on Yangzi River. The total length of the transmission line reaches 1907 kM. The rated voltage is 800kV, and maximum continue power is 7,000MW. The operation in 1.5 years, no critical fault was find on main 800kV DC equipments, which means the feasibility of 800 kV UHVDC transmission technology has been fully proved. 1.2 The demand of 1100 kV UHVDC transmission technology. Due to the inverse distribution between energy resources and economic development in China, the optimal allocation of the energy resource over a large area is objectively necessary [1,2]. For hydropower, thirteen huge bases have been scheduled w ith about 215GW installed capacity. Among them, the exploitable capacity of Tibet reaches up to about 110GW. For thermal power, many large coal bases have been with exploitable condition. Except the local consumption, the prospective power delivery scale can reach 200GW. Among them, the estimated capacity of thermal power plants in Sinkiang is 50GW, and most will be delivered to load center[3]. The distance from the huge energy bases in Tibet and Sinkiang to load center exceeds 2500 km. In case of 800kV UHVDC technology, the transmission loss will exceed 10% according to the investigation [2], which is not the optimal solution. For this distance, 1100kV UHVDC transmission is a effective solution of electric power delivery, and lays a firm foundation for the development of the huge energy resource bases. Meanwhile, due to the reduction of the transmission line and loss, the more power can be transmitted using less Line corridors, which means high efficiency of the land resource. It is in line with requirements of constructing the resource-conserving and environmentally friendly society in China. 1.3 The R&D of 1000 kV UHVDC and pilot project. At the end of 2010, SGCC proposed decided that the next HVDC voltage level is 1100 kV. Based on the feasibility study on equipments, system, and economic, the main parameters is defined. The rated power is 1100 kV. The rated current is 4750A, and the rated power is 10450MW. According to the planning of China, 30GW electrical power will be transmitted from Sinkiang to central China mainly with 3 UHVDC lines. Among them, there is 1100 kV pilot project, ZhundongChengdu project, as shown in figure 1. The sending side is thermal power, and the receiving side is mainly hydro power.

Fig 1. 1100 kV Pilot project 1100 kV UHVDC is featured by the highest voltage, largest capacity and longest distance, and is a new height of power transmission technology. The engineering design and equipments development

are great challenges. Furthermore, no existing experience in the world can be used for reference. According to the experience of 800 kV UHVDC construction, the requirements of high end equipments, such as 1100 kV converter transformer, bushing, has almost reach the utmost limitation of the electrical equipment and material capability. At the beginning of 2008, SGCC start the R&D of UHVDC study beyond 800 kV including main circuit, overvoltage and insulation coordination, air clearance, external insulation, Electromagnetic environment, key equipments, etc[4-6]. 2. The R&D progress of key technology 2.1 Main circuit 2 and 3 series converter topologies are studied. Considering cost and operation, 2 series converter topology with average voltage distribution topology is adopted, that is 550kV+550kV. The basics of this topology is almost same with Xiangjiaba-shanghai project. Based on the facts of pilot project, 4 smoothing reactors are used, and the reactance is 60mh, which is also distributed on two poles. The impedance of transformer is 24%, which is difficult for transformer itself, but good to the voltage and overvoltage suppress in DC system. 2.2 Overvoltage and insulation coordination The overvoltage level is very critical to equipment development. In the study, different surge arrester configurations are considered with different overvoltage level. To deeply suppress the overvoltage, the advanced surge arrester is considered, which means great energy level. Following configuration in figure 2 is adopted.

Fig 2. Configuration of surge arrester topology The highest overvoltage is on the pole line and high end converter transformer valve bushing side. The calculation result is 2100kV(SIWL) and 2300kV(SIWL). For the transmission line, the highest overvoltage point normally is located on the mid-point of transmission line, but the study shown different result for 1100kV line. The SI level is 1.6p.u without line surge arrester. It is found that the C1 value is an important parameter for SI level. Lager C1 value means higher SI. If line surge arrester is used, the SI could be 1.5 p.u or lower. Generally, current study shown that the overvoltage level is not a critical point for the design of transmission line any more. The length of external insulator is decided by the operation voltage, and the air clearance is mainly decided by the electromagnetic environment limitation. 2.3 Air Clearance Switch impulse test and study of DC tower has finished on different elevation, mainly in Beijing and Tibet as shown in figure 3. Based on the result and overvoltage study, the minimum air clearance of DC tower is proposed, which is 8.5m on 0 m elevation, and 9.6m on 2000m elevation for 1.6 p.u overvoltage level. To the converter station, part of typical air clearance is studied. The model of valve is also made to study the characteristics of valve shielding cover. The size of connectors, such as bus, shielding ball, are still not decided, and optimization of equipment configuration in valve hall is ongoing.

2500 U50 kV 2250 2000 1750 1500 1250 1000 5 6 7 8 9 m Meters 10 11 12

8 Beijing
Tibet 8

Fig 3. U50 distance 2.4 External insulation To transmission line, considering the cross section of transmission conductors is very large. The pollution test in full voltage has been done on Large-tonnage insulator including 550kN CA-785, 400kN CA-765, and 760kN CA-791. In the test, four kinds of salt concentration level are used. To converter station, the salt concentration level of zhundong side has been investigated, which is 0.06mg/cm2,and the creepage is recommended 45mm/kV for normal composite insulators 2.5 Electromagnetic environment The electromagnetic environment study mainly focused on the transmission line. Based on the calculation, the 8*1000mm2 conductor is recommended as well as the pole distance and conductor height. However, the current theory assumes very clean environment, which is not suitable for North China. The impact on different climate and cleanness is going now. 3. The R&D progress of key equipments The R&D of key equipments mainly focused on the high-end transformer and wall bushing. Analyzing the impact of improved voltage, the most difficult part is converter transformer and wall bushing. The key parameters of them are listed in table 1 and table 2. Table 1: Important parameters of 1100kV converter transformer Windings Y/ Rated voltage Maximum steady phase voltage Rated power (SN2w) Current under 2 poles in operation Rated current Maximum continuous current Range Step Impedance Tolerance % % % Arms Arms 1219 1409 25/-3 1.25 24.0 1.0 3878 4146 2239 2394 kVrms kVrms MVA 444.56 461.88 542.11 Lind side Valve side Y 139.78 145.36 542.11 242.10 251.76 542.11

Table 2: Important parameters of wall bushing Rated voltage continuous DC current (Adc) (2h)overload DC currentAdc Maximum continuous DC voltage, to-ground Udmax(kVdc) Maximum Voltage Um ,phase-ground(kVrms) Level 1 test voltage (kVrms ) Level 2 test voltage (kVrms ) 1100kV 5078 5367 1120 792 396 832

Level 3 test voltage (kVrms ) 1190 On May, 2011, the development of transformer mock-up and wall bushing is started. It is found the external insulator is one of bottlenecks due to the extra length and dimension. Within seven months, the design is almost finished. It is schedule to pass type test on June, 2012. 4. The R&D of on-site assembling for 1100kV converter transformer Because of the improved DC voltage and capacity, the size and voltage is enlarged greatly. It is not possible to transported by railway or long distance road. The preliminary designed size and voltage is shown in table 3. Table 3: Estimated size and transportation weight of converter transformer
Converter transformer Transportation Weightt Size(LWHm)

High end

510

13.84.85.8

Low end 445 11.04.65.58 In China, the transportation limits of railway is 13m3.5m4.85m, 350t. To long distance road transportation, numerous bridges need to be enhanced to satisfy the weight requirements, and update to satisfy the size requirement, especially the height. It is not feasible because of extremely high cost. The on-site assembling(OSA) solution is proposed. Winding blocks could be manufactured in factory and delivered to site, the oil tank is designed on two pieces or six pieces in factory. Core sheets, insulation materials, bushings are delivered to site. Transformer is assembled on site, as shown in figure 4.

Fig 4: concept of on-site assembling. The selection of workshop on site is a big issue. Constructing new building means huge investment. It is proposed that HV valve hall could be used for OSA. The valve halls required index of sealing, temperature control and moisture control are same or higher than manufacture workshop. The dimension is also enough for manufacture with the 2 units per month productivity. To satisfy the

requirement of manufacture, the necessary manufacture equipments are installed including crane, gantry crane, core assembly platform, oven, oil filter machine, etc. When the manufacture finishes, the valve hall will be recovered and install the valves and transformers. A new test hall will be constructed. The assembled transformer is transported from valve hall to test hall directly. All necessary test equipments are available on site. In them, the generator solution for loss measurement is still not decided because of the complexity. The study of converter or voltage regulator solution is ongoing. The required capacity may result in very high cost. The dimension of test hall has been discussed and reached a preliminary result. After test, the transformer will be transported to platform directly. No dis-assembly process, which is an advantage of OSA. Due to the reduced transportation/disassembly/assembly process, the quality of transformer is enhanced a lot. Another issue is the transformer failure during operation. Because the transportation is unavailable, it is necessary to find the repair solution on site. In whole technical solution, the test hall is used to repair transformer on site. The layout of valve hall is shown in figure 5.

Fig 5. Layout of Valve hall (Manufacture workshop)

5. The next step of R&D Based on the previous study progress, the critical parts are the equipment developments, mainly converter transformer mock-up and wall bushing, and detailed OSA technical solution. According the R&D schedule and project construction schedule, the type test of transformer mock-up and wall bushing will be done on June, 2012. OSA technical solution will be done before June,2012. To the transmission line aspects, the external insulation test and study will be continued by very long and large ton insulators. The test and study of electro-magnetic environment will be continued using 8*1000mm2 conductor.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1] [2] [3] [4] Liu Zhenya, UHV Network, China Economy Press, 2005. Liu Zhenya, Shu Yinbiao, Zhang Wenliang, Study on Voltage Class Series for HVDC Transmission System, Proceedings of the CSEE200710(28)1-8(in Chinese) Zhang WenliangZhou XiaoxinGuo Jianboet alFeasibility of 1000 kV Ultra HVDC in the power grid of China[J]Proceedings of the CSEE200727(28)1-7(in Chinese). Shu YinbiaoLiu ZehongGao Liyinget alA preliminary exploration for design of 800kV UHVDC project with transmission capacity of 6400MW[J]Power System Technology 2006,30(1)1-8(in Chinese)

[5] Zhang Wenliang, Yu Yongqing, Li Guangfan, et al. Researches on UHVDC technology[J] Proceedings of the CSEE200727(22)1-7(in Chinese) [6] Astrom U.Weimers L.Leseale V , Power transmission with HVDC at voltages above 600 kV 2005 IEEE/PES Power Engineering Society Inaugural Conference and Exposition in Africa 2005