Radiation Losses from a Single Wire Earth Return Power Line with Bends

It is desirable to use existing single wire earth return (SWER) lines for data communication as well as transmitting power in remote areas. The radiation losses of the communication signal is a critical system design parameter. Existing radiation models are not adequate since they assume: firstly that the antenna is a small number of wavelengths long and secondly that the currents along the line are constant, so that no power lost in radiation. The model presented here overcomes these limitations. The model shows that bends in the SWER line significantly effect both the radiated power and the radiation patterns.