Digital Analysis of the Breakdown Process in High-Voltage Circuit Breakers

Abstract

More and more computational fluid dynamics tools or CFD tools are used to analyze and study gas flows inside high-voltage circuit breaker chambers and to reduce testing. These tools are built upon the classical physical fluid dynamics equations by integrating very complex models. The numbers of variants of SF6 interrupting chambers are now quite numerous based on their specific applications. These tools permit to estimate, analyze, and understand better the interrupting process. These tools also increase our knowledge about the gas flow behavior inside the chambers. This leads to the optimization of the shapes and geometric parameters of the circuit breaker interrupters