CFD Analysis of a High Voltage Circuit Breaker

Abstract

Electricity is the main component of our daily life. Without this we can not imagine the existence of life. Due to increased demand of electricity, its safety requirement, transportation and optimization of its component is an essential factor which can not be neglected. High voltage circuit breaker is an equipment which interrupt the current under critical condition from the circuit, as name suggests. To optimize and increase the life period of circuit breaker, modification in circuit breaker is done continuously by improving the circuit breaker design. The time and money required for experimental testing of circuit breaker can be saved by carrying out CFD analysis of high voltage circuit breaker.

In the present study, commercial CFD software Fluent was used to carry out numerical simulation of 145 kV high voltage circuit breaker at M/s ABB Ltd., Vadodara; which is one of their standard product. The 2D computational model was created in Gambit and meshed with unstructured grid. Unsteady state simulations were carried out using Unsteady Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes (URANS) equation alongwith standard k-ɛ turbulence model. To consider the effects of moving boundary, arc generation, variation in properties of SF6 etc. different UDFs were written and incorporated in Fluent to carry out numerical investigations. From the analysis, pressure and temperature contours were found near the arc generation zone as well as puffer and self blast volumes. The CFD results were compared with the results provided by M/s ABB Ltd and literature and found in satisfactory agreement.