The interaction of plasma with liquids has led to various established industrial implementations as well as promising applications, including high-voltage switching, chemical analysis, nanomaterial synthesis, and plasma medicine. Along with these numerous accomplishments, the physics of plasma in liquid or in contact with a liquid surface has emerged as a bipartite research field, for which we introduce here the term “plasma physics of liquids.” Despite the intensive research investments during the recent decennia, this field is plagued by some controversies and gaps in knowledge, which might restrict further progress. The main difficulties in understanding revolve around the basic mechanisms of plasma initiation in the liquid phase and the electrical interactions at a plasma-liquid interface, which require an interdisciplinary approach. This review aims to provide the wide applied physics community with a general overview of the field, as well as the opportunities for interdisciplinary research on topics, such as nanobubbles and the floating water bridge, and involving the research domains of amorphous semiconductors, solid state physics, thermodynamics, material science, analytical chemistry, electrochemistry, and molecular dynamics simulations. In addition, we provoke awareness of experts in the field on yet underappreciated question marks. Accordingly, a strategy for future experimental and simulation work is proposed.

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Plasma physics of liquids—A focused review

Online partial discharge (PD) measurements have long been used as an effective means to assess the condition of the stator windings of large generators. An increase in the use of PD online measurement systems during the last decade is evident. Improvements in the detection capabilities are partly the reason for the increased popularity. Another reason has been the development of digital signal processing techniques. In addition, rapid progress is being made in automated single PD source classification. However, there are still some factors hindering wider application of the system, such as the complex PD mechanism and PD pulse propagation in stator windings, the presence of detrimental noise and disturbances on-site, and multiple PD sources occurring simultaneously. To avoid repetition of past work and to provide an overview for fresh researchers in this area, this paper presents a comprehensive survey of the state-of-the-art knowledge on PD mechanism, PD pulse propagation in stator windings, PD signal detection methods and signal processing techniques. Areas for further research are also presented.

A Review of Online Partial Discharge Measurement of Large Generators

The paper, prepared by CIGRE WG D1.03 (TF 09), presents the guidelines for risk assessment procedure on defects in GIS based on PD diagnostics. The procedure, described in detail in CIGRE Technical Brochure 525, starts with sensitive PD measurement to detect the critical defects and follows with identification of the type of the defect and its location inside the GIS. This information taken together with other essential data from laboratory measurements, manufacturer's experience, design aspects and trend analysis of the PD activity, are the base for the estimation of the criticality of the defects. Finally, the risk assessment is performed based on the estimated dielectric failure probability and failure consequences that can be different in case of on-site testing or in service activity.

Risk Assessment on Defects in GIS based on PD Diagnostics

Optimizing GIS partial discharge pattern recognition in the ubiquitous power internet of things context: A MixNet deep learning model

Partial discharge (PD) detection is an effective way to find defects and diagnose the insulation condition of power equipment. During manufacturing and operating, there may exist multi-source PD signals in the equipment, which could seriously affect the accuracy of subsequent defect analyses. In this paper, a universal separation methodology using linear prediction analysis (LPA) and the isolation forest algorithm (IFA) is introduced. By approximating the present waveform point by a linear combination of several points in the past, a 12-D linear prediction cepstrum coefficient (LPCC) feature space can be established which can accurately characterize PD waveforms. In this paper, we applied principal component analysis (PCA) to reduce the feature space to 2-D space. The IFA was adopted to separate multi-source PD signals which quantified the degree of clustering and added one more parameter based on the original features. Thus, the proposed method can separate multiple PD sources effectively even if the difference in the features of different types of PDs is small. In addition, the proposed algorithm easily removed the noise points during the separation process. The algorithm was applied to different types of PD signals on 35-kV transformers and a three-source PD data set on a 252-kV gas-insulated switchgear (GIS) platform. The separation results confirm that the proposed algorithm can effectively separate and distinguish various PD signals.

Separating Multi-Source Partial Discharge Signals Using Linear Prediction Analysis and Isolation Forest Algorithm

Partial discharge (PD) measurement and interpretation have become a powerful tool for condition monitoring and failure risk assessment of high voltage power equipment insulation. The occurrence of multiple discharge sources affects interpretation accuracy. This paper presents a PD signal separation algorithm using cumulative energy (CE) function parameters clustering technique. The waveform of PD signals are acquired by digital detection instruments with high sampling rate. Cumulative energy functions in time domain (TCE) and frequency domain (FCE) are calculated from PD waveforms and their FFT spectrums, respectively. Mathematical morphology gradient (MMG) operation is applied to the TCE and FCE to describe their variation characteristics. The feature parameters including width, sharpness and gravity are extracted from CEs and MMGs in both time and frequency domain, and compose a six-dimension feature space. The improved density-based spatial clustering of applications with noise (IDBSCAN) clustering algorithm is adopted to discover clusters in the feature space. The proposed separation algorithm is examined with mixed current impulse signals acquired from PD experiments on artificial multi-defect models and an on-site transformer. The separation results indicate that the proposed algorithm is effective for separating mixed PD signals initiated from multiple sources.

Partial discharge signals separation using cumulative energy function and mathematical morphology gradient

Due to its excellent performance, oil-paper insulation has been widely used in many power apparatuses including converter transformer of high voltage direct current (HVDC) system. Space charge accumulation phenomena may significantly distort local electric field inside transformer and cause oil-paper insulation overstressing. As a result of long term operation, oil-paper gradually degrades. In most severe cases, the breakdown of insulation system may occur. In this work, the effect of space charge on breakdown characteristics of aged oil-paper insulation is investigated. Oil-paper samples with different aging states are obtained by thermally accelerated aging for various periods of time, categorized by the degree of polymerization (DP) of 1107 (new), 725, 504, 376 and 241, respectively. Experimental results show that the breakdown voltage of oil-paper samples without pre-stressing remains almost constant with thermal degradation. After the homo-polarity pre-stress, when the DP value is higher than ∼300 (from 1107 to 376), the breakdown voltage has an increasing tendency with an increase in thermal degradation. On the contrary, the breakdown voltage presents a decreasing tendency after the hetero-polarity pre-stress. When the DP is lower than ∼300 (DP241), the changes of breakdown voltage does not remain the same trend as previous samples after pre-stressing. Meanwhile, space charge distributions in different aged samples are measured by the pulsed electro-acoustic (PEA) method, and the trap parameters are correspondingly evaluated. It has been experimentally demonstrated that special attention should be paid to space charge accumulation and aging state of oil-paper insulation, which may lead to severe insulation accidents.

Effect of space charge on breakdown characteristics of aged oil-paper insulation under DC voltage

The degradation of oil-impregnated paper induced by partial discharge (PD) seriously affects the life of power equipment. In order to investigate the relationship between partial discharge and the degradation of oil-impregnated paper, PD characteristics and trap parameters of the impregnated paper are measured. In this work, a cavity discharge model is adopted and samples with different degrees of polymerization (DP) are fabricated using thermally accelerated aging to simulate transformers with different lifetimes. For each sample, phase resolved partial discharge (PRPD) spectrograms are recorded for various partial discharge times. The characteristics of partial discharge are analyzed, and the trap parameters of specimens are obtained by the thermally stimulated depolarization current (TSDC) method. Following this, the microstructures of the samples are observed using a scanning electron microscope (SEM). It is found that the damaging breakdown process of oil-immersed paper can be divided into three stages: initial stage, developing stage and pre-breakdown stage. There also exist two levels of trap on the surface of oil-impregnated paper: shallow (0.10-0.59 eV) and relatively deep (0.60-0.90 eV) energy. Importantly, the thermal aging makes the trap energy deeper while electrical aging makes the trap energy shallower.

Partial discharge characteristics and trap parameters of aged oil-impregnated paper

The oil-paper insulation in a transformer gradually ages due to the combined effects of thermal and electrical stress that occur during its operation. In this paper, for investigating the changes that occur within the oil-paper during the aging process with different aging stresses, partial discharge (PD) characteristics and trap parameters are measured. An internal discharge cavity model is designed for the electrical stress, and the thermal stress is generated by a baking oven simultaneously. The experiments are designed such that the dominant factor on the aging process is either thermal, electrical, or a unity of both stress factors. The phase resolved partial discharge (PRPD) spectrograms are recorded at different aging time, and the trap parameters are extracted by thermally stimulated depolarization current (TSDC) method. Additionally, the surface morphologies of these samples are observed by using a scanning electron microscope (SEM). The results show that the trap energy presents a decreasing tendency when the electrical stress plays the dominant role, and the discharge energy becomes larger over the aging time until pre-breakdown. When the thermal stress dominates the aging process, the trap energy shows an increasing tendency over the aging time, and there exists a process of ‘material conditioning’ that occurs at the initial stage of the aging process. The change of trap parameters in aged oil-paper will further affect PD characteristics. Correlation analysis of PD and trap characteristics can promote more accurate condition estimation of aged oil-paper.

A study of oil-impregnated paper insulation aged with thermal-electrical stress: PD characteristics and trap parameters

The invention discloses a system used for measuring internal space charges of an oil paper insulating material The system comprises an upper electrode system body and a lower electrode system The upper electrode system body comprises an upper electrode, a direct-current high-pressure source and an impulse source The lower electrode system body comprises a lower electrode, a piezoelectric sensor and a wide-band amplifier According to the system, due to a sealing ring and an exhaust module, consistency of features such as the temperature and the micro-water content of a tested object can be ensured in the process of measuring distribution of the internal space charges of the oil paper insulating material; the phenomenon that water is absorbed from air in the process of measuring the space charges and changes of the micro-water content in the tested object can be avoided mainly; in additional, the upper electrode system body is a whole with the fixed weight, on the premise that the thickness of the tested object is uniform, stress on the tested object can be uniform, the problem that due to the fact that the upper electrode system body is fixed manually in an existing measuring system, the pressure is not uniform, and deviation of the measured result occurs can be solved, so that the measured result is more accurate

Yan-Hui Wei

Papers

Partial discharge signals separation using cumulative energy function and mathematical morphology gradient

Effect of space charge on breakdown characteristics of aged oil-paper insulation under DC voltage

Partial discharge characteristics and trap parameters of aged oil-impregnated paper

A study of oil-impregnated paper insulation aged with thermal-electrical stress: PD characteristics and trap parameters

System used for measuring internal space charges of oil paper insulating material