Method and system for the determination of wind speeds and incident radiation parameters of overhead power lines

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method and system for the determination of parameters related to the speed of wind that blows near an overhead electrical power line (single or bundle conductors). The parameters include an “effective wind speed” as well as an “effective incident radiation” acting on a power line span. The measurement is made by using the combination of mechanical vibrations and movements/positions in two or three dimensions through sensors in direct link with the power line conductor.

Description

FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0001]The present invention relates to a method and system for the determination of parameters related to the speed of wind that blows near an overhead electrical power line (single or bundle conductors). In particular, such parameters include an effective perpendicular wind speed (hereinafter referred to as the “effective wind speed”), which is the speed that would have a wind blowing perpendicularly to the conductor axis and having the same cooling effect on the conductor as the actual wind. In addition, the combination of solar radiation and albedo on power line conductor is hereinafter referred to as the “effective incident radiation”.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0002]As explained in U.S. Pat. No. 8,184,015, continuous monitoring of electrical power lines, in particular high-voltage overhead lines, is essential to timely detect anomalous conditions which could lead to a power outage. Measurement of the sag of power lines to determine whether the sag is lower...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0023]The present invention meets a need for a power line device and method overcoming at least some of the problems left open by prior art solutions. The present invention is based on a power line sensor directly fixed on the powe

Problems solved by technology

Indeed, power lines in the field are always subject to movements and vibrations, which may be very small but detectable by their accelerations in both time and frequency domains.

A drawback of all these methods about weather conditions is that none of them is able to generate appropriate weather data which are actually to be used to calculate ampacity, which is a value linked to all critical spans of a power lines.

A critical span is a span for which there is a significant risk of potential clearance violation in any kind of weather situations.

But wind speed measurement is tricky for various reasons.

First, it is not stationary as wind speed can vary significantly within minutes, and there may be wind gusts.

Therefore, a single-spot measurement does not allow computing the global effect of the wind over the whole span.

Similarly, a single-spot measurement of “effective incident radiation” does not allow computing the global effect of the combined effect of sun and albedo over the whole span.

However, this is only a partial solution to the monitoring problem and such systems are solely oriented to evaluate the life time of power line conductor due to the bending fatigue induced by Aeolian vibrations cycles on conductor strands near clamps.

Beside the fact that they only allow a partial monitoring of the power line, all of these methods suffer from drawbacks: optical techniques are sensitive to reductions of the visibility induced by meteorological conditions while the other measurement methods are

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