Technology and Application of Power Switching Equipment for Future Power Systems

Power switching equipment serves as the core apparatus for electricity dispatch, operational mode conversion, and fault clearance, acting as the "safety guardian" of the power system. Its failure could lead to system collapse or widespread equipment damage. In each technological transformation of power systems, power switching equipment has been a critical bottleneck. With the objective of achieving technological independence in power switching equipment, the innovation team led by professor Rong Mingzhe at Xi’an Jiaotong University has made groundbreaking advances in three areas: AC switching equipment technology, DC switching equipment technology, and digital design along with next-generation switching equipment technology. First, by overturning the traditional passive approach that relies on natural current zero-crossing for interruption, a new AC interruption method was proposed that actively regulates the arc zero-region and current zero-point. This enabled the successful development of a 350 kV/80 kA double-break circuit breaker and the world’s first 31. 5 kV/210 kA environmentally friendly generator circuit breaker, resolving the challenge of interrupting extremely high short-circuit currents. Second, abandoning the conventional technique that requires external devices to force current zero-crossing a novel DC interruption principle driven by arc energy was pioneered turning the harmful effects of arcing into an advantage. This resulted in the development of 4 kV/70 kA and 10 kV/100 kA medium-voltage DC switching equipment, establishing a leading international position in high-capacity DC interruption technology, Finally, a multi-component discharge plasma fundamental database and digital design software for power switching equipment were developed, establishing a digital design system for switching equipment. Based on this, China’s first 126 kV high-voltage fluorine free environmentally friendly gas-insulated switchgear (GIS) and the world’s highest-voltage 800 kV intelligent switching equipment were developed, leading the trend toward environmental sustainability and intelligence in power switching equipment. Looking forward to the development of future power systems.