A study on electrical properties of eco-friendly non-crosslinked polyethylene

The crosslinked polyethylene (XLPE) has most widely been used for the power cable insulating layer due to its outstanding properties such as electrical breakdown and mechanical strength. However, in terms of environmental issue, one of drawbacks for application of XLPE is its thermosetting property, which makes the XLPE not to be reused after service or removal. In this work, we investigated the basic electrical properties such as AC breakdown strength, DC conductivity and water treeing, of newly developed non-crosslinked polyethylene(PE) and polypropylene(PP) samples in comparison with conventional power cable XLPE. It has been shown that the properties of non-crosslinked PE and PP could be controlled by additives and formulation of compounds, and some of the samples had better performance compared to the XLPE.