Design optimization of high voltage composite insulator using Electric field computations

In power system, the consistent power supply plays a vital role in generation, transmission and distribution. It is necessary to aid uninterrupted power supply by continuous monitoring of power apparatus. Mainly insulators are the integral part of the power system. Among them composite insulators are essential for the better performance. One of the major factors governing the electrical performance of composite insulator is characterised by its field distribution along their length. In this paper, an attempt has been made to analysis the factors affect the Electric field (E-field) distribution are discussed. The analysis are performed by designing a different configuration of metal end fittings in composite insulator and compared their results and shows which configuration shows better performance under normal conditions, because end fitting dimension is one of the major factor that govern the characteristics of the composite insulators. Furthermore to improve the electric behaviour of the composite insulators grading material is introduced. The main objective of this work is to improve the electric field distribution of composite insulator, in order to enhance the long term performance of insulator. An 11kV composite insulator is modelled by using COMSOL MULTIPHYSICS software that performs two dimension (2D) and three dimension (3D) finite element method to investigate the E-field distribution.