Towers for support of the lines are made of wood (as-grown or laminated), steel or aluminum (either lattice structures or tubular poles), concrete, and occasionally reinforced plastics. The bare wire conductors on the line are generally made of aluminum (either plain or reinforced with steel, or composite materials such as carbon and glass fiber), though some copper wires are used in medium-voltage distribution and low-voltage connections to customer premises. A major goal of overhead power line design is to maintain adequate clearance between energized conductors and the ground so as to prevent dangerous contact with the line, and to provide reliable support for the conductors, resilience to storms, ice loads, earthquakes and other potential damage causes.[1]Today overhead lines are routinely operated at voltages exceeding 765,000 volts between conductors, with even higher voltages possible in some cases.
Structures for overhead lines take a variety of shapes depending on the type of line. Structures may be as simple as wood poles directly set in the earth, carrying one or more cross-arm beams to support conductors, or "armless" construction with conductors supported on insulators attached to the side of the pole. Tubular steel poles are typically used in urban areas. High-voltage lines are often carried on lattice-type steel towers or pylons. For remote areas, aluminum towers may be placed by helicopters.[4][5] Concrete poles have also been used.[1] Poles made of reinforced plastics are also available, but their high cost restricts application.
Each structure must be designed for the loads imposed on it by the conductors.[1] The weight of the conductor must be supported, as well as dynamic loads due to wind and ice accumulation, and effects of vibration. Where conductors are in a straight line, towers need only resist the weight since the tension in the conductors approximately balances with no resultant force on the structure. Flexible conductors supported at their ends approximate the form of a catenary, and much of the analysis for construction of transmission lines relies on the properties of this form.[1]
A large transmission line project may have several types of towers, with "tangent" ("suspension" or "line" towers, UK) towers intended for most positions and more heavily constructed towers used for turning the line through an angle, dead-ending (terminating) a line, or for important river or road crossings. Depending on the design criteria for a particular line, semi-flexible type structures may rely on the weight of the conductors to be balanced on both sides of each tower. More rigid structures may be intended to remain standing even if one or more conductors is broken. Such structures may be installed at intervals in power lines to limit the scale of cascading tower failures.[1]
A double-circuit transmission line has two circuits. For three-phase systems, each tower supports and insulates six conductors. Single phase AC-power lines as used for traction current have four conductors for two circuits. Usually both circuits operate at the same voltage.
In some countries like Germany most power lines with voltages above 100 kV are implemented as double, quadruple or in rare cases even hextuple power line as rights of way are rare. Sometimes all conductors are installed with the erection of the pylons; often some circuits are installed later. A disadvantage of double circuit transmission lines is that maintenance can be difficult, as either work in close proximity of high voltage or switch-off of two circuits is required. In case of failure, both systems can be affected.
Overhead power lines are often equipped with a ground conductor (shield wire, static wire, or overhead earth wire). The ground conductor is usually grounded (earthed) at the top of the supporting structure, to minimize the likelihood of direct lightning strikes to the phase conductors.[17] In circuits with earthed neutral, it also serves as a parallel path with the earth for fault currents. Very high-voltage transmission lines may have two ground conductors. These are either at the outermost ends of the highest cross beam, at two V-shaped mast points, or at a separate cross arm. Older lines may use surge arresters every few spans in place of a shield wire; this configuration is typically found in the more rural areas of the United States. By protecting the line from lightning, the design of apparatus in substations is simplified due to lower stress on insulation. Shield wires on transmission lines may include optical fibers (optical ground wires/OPGW), used for communication and control of the power system.
A compact overhead transmission line requires a smaller right of way than a standard overhead powerline. Conductors must not get too close to each other. This can be achieved either by short span lengths and insulating crossbars, or by separating the conductors in the span with insulators. The first type is easier to build as it does not require insulators in the span, which may be difficult to install and to maintain.
Low voltage overhead lines may use either bare conductors carried on glass or ceramic insulators or an aerial bundled cable system. The number of conductors may be anywhere between two (most likely a phase and neutral) up to as many as six (three phase conductors, separate neutral and earth plus street lighting supplied by a common switch); a common case is four (three phase and neutral, where the neutral might also serve as a protective earthing conductor).
Overhead lines or overhead wires are used to transmit electrical energy to trams, trolleybuses or trains. Overhead line is designed on the principle of one or more overhead wires situated over rail tracks. Feeder stations at regular intervals along the overhead line supply power from the high-voltage grid. For some cases low-frequency AC is used, and distributed by a special traction current network.
Overhead lines are also occasionally used to supply transmitting antennas, especially for efficient transmission of long, medium and short waves. For this purpose a staggered array line is often used. Along a staggered array line the conductor cables for the supply of the earth net of the transmitting antenna are attached on the exterior of a ring, while the conductor inside the ring, is fastened to insulators leading to the high-voltage standing feeder of the antenna.
Use of the area below an overhead line is limited because objects must not come too close to the energized conductors. Overhead lines and structures may shed ice, creating a hazard. Radio reception can be impaired under a power line, due both to shielding of a receiver antenna by the overhead conductors, and by partial discharge at insulators and sharp points of the conductors which creates radio noise.
Overhead distribution and transmission lines near airfields are often marked on maps, and the lines themselves marked with conspicuous plastic reflectors, to warn pilots of the presence of conductors.
Construction of overhead power lines, especially in wilderness areas, may have significant environmental effects. Environmental studies for such projects may consider the effect of bush clearing, changed migration routes for migratory animals, possible access by predators and humans along transmission corridors, disturbances of fish habitat at stream crossings, and other effects.
However the first practical use of overhead lines was in the context of telegraphy. By 1837 experimental commercial telegraph systems ran as far as 20 km (13 miles). Electric power transmission was accomplished in 1882 with the first high-voltage transmission between Munich and Miesbach (60 km). 1891 saw the construction of the first three-phase alternating current overhead line on the occasion of the International Electricity Exhibition in Frankfurt, between Lauffen and Frankfurt.
In 1953, the first 345 kV line was put into service by American Electric Power in the United States. In Germany in 1957 the first 380 kV overhead power line was commissioned (between the transformer station and Rommerskirchen). In the same year the overhead line traversing of the Strait of Messina went into service in Italy, whose pylons served the Elbe crossing 1. This was used as the model for the building of the Elbe crossing 2 in the second half of the 1970s which saw the construction of the highest overhead line pylons of the world. Earlier, in 1952, the first 380 kV line was put into service in Sweden, in 1000 km (625 miles) between the more populated areas in the south and the largest hydroelectric power stations in the north.Starting from 1967 in Russia, and also in the USA and Canada, overhead lines for voltage of 765 kV were built. In 1982 overhead power lines were built in Soviet Union between Elektrostal and the power station at Ekibastuz, this was a three-phase alternating current line at 1150 kV (Powerline Ekibastuz-Kokshetau). In 1999, in Japan the first powerline designed for 1000 kV with 2 circuits were built, the Kita-Iwaki Powerline. In 2003 the building of the highest overhead line commenced in China, the Yangtze River Crossing.
An overhead power line is one example of a transmission line. At power system frequencies, many useful simplifications can be made for lines of typical lengths. For analysis of power systems, the distributed resistance, series inductance, shunt leakage resistance and shunt capacitance can be replaced with suitable lumped values or simplified networks.
Here, we explain the outline of the directional wind-resistant design method in JEC-TR [1]. To consider the wind dynamic effects, JEC-TR adopted the equivalent static wind load method by gust effect factors [2]. The unique idea, which is not introduced in standards of the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) and American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE), is to elaborate formulae applicable to arbitrary wind directions and stringing conditions with similar accuracies. In other words, the JEC-TR method can estimate each sub-system wind load (wind force on tower, overhead wire and insulator, and tension force) for arbitrary wind directions and their combination by the formulae of non-simultaneity of fluctuating components. To achieve this, JEC-TR provides elaborate formulae for tension forces and non-simultaneity reduction coefficients theoretically introduced by correlation coefficients of the fluctuating components between forward and backward spans, which are not clearly shown in IEC and ASCE standards. Fig. 1 shows the schematics of the JEC-TR method. Designers first set 72 wind directions with a 5º-pitch (Fig. 1 (a)); thereafter, the mean and fluctuating components of each sub-system wind load are estimated (Fig. 1 (b)). Finally, transverse and longitudinal loads are calculated as the sum of the mean and fluctuating components multiplied by the non-simultaneity reduction coefficient (Fig. 1 (c)) to assess various wind loads for each wind direction. The method described above is also employed in JEC-5101.
d5bc57d000