Temperature Dependency of Ion Mobility in Synthetic Ester by Dielectric Response Analysis in Time and Frequency Domain

Abstract

Synthetic ester is a promising alternative to mineral oil for emerging applications relying on high-power static conversion, such as solid-state transformers (SST). The highly compact components used in SSTs must fulfill MV-DC insulation requirements to guarantee the safe operation of the system, therefore, their design relies on the characterization of the dielectric stress caused by the electric field. The prediction of the electric field induced by DC voltages requires analyzing the conduction phenomena in the liquid, including the effect of charge transport due to ion drift. In this scenario, one of the critical parameters that determine the transport of charge and the resulting electric field distribution is the mobility of ions μ; the value of μ in synthetic ester is available only at room temperature, however, investigations on other dielectric liquids indicate a significant temperature dependency, which therefore needs to be characterized. In this paper, the temperature dependency of μ in synthetic ester liquid is determined by comparing alternative methodologies based on the analysis of the dielectric response in the time and frequency domain, and the viscosity of the fluid. The characteristics obtained by these methodologies are consistent; the temperature dependency of μ obeys the Arrhenius law and an increase of one order of magnitude starting from 1.1 × 10 <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">–10</sup> m <sup xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">2</sup> /Vs is observed in the 303K–353K temperature range.