Developing Equipment to Detect the Deterioration Status of 6.6kV Power Cables in Operation at Power Station

The technology to predict and prevent an accident of the cable system in power station is required. The techniques of inactivated diagnosis, partial discharge and tanδ, have been adopted to diagnoze the operating characteristics of cables, but it is not so easy to find out problems in cables in an inactive state before the cable accident happens. In this paper, we did a research on the 6.6kV high-power cables, installed at Korean Western Power Station Co., Ltd. in order to diagonize the cables, playing a major role at the station. We have developed an equipment to measure an insulation resistance based on the temperature and current of the cable. By installing the system in a power station, we could find abnormal status for evaluation of the lifetime. In the short term, by analyzing the data, we apply the research result to the diagnosis and evaluation of the 6.6kV power cables. In the long run, however, we plan to reduce the cost of the installation and operation of cable systems at power stations.