Traction power systems for electrified railways:evolution,state of the art,and future trends

Traction power systems(TPSs)play a vital role in the operation of electrified railways.The transformation of conventional railway TPSs to novel structures is not only a trend to promote the development of electrified railways toward high-efficiency and resilience but also an inevitable requirement to achieve carbon neutrality target.On the basis of sorting out the power supply structures of conventional AC and DC modes,this paper first reviews the characteristics of the existing TPSs,such as weak power supply flexibility and low-energy efficiency.Furthermore,the power supply structures of various TPSs for future electrified railways are described in detail,which satisfy longer distance,low-carbon,high-efficiency,high-reliability and high-quality power supply requirements.Meanwhile,the application prospects of different traction modes are discussed from both technical and economic aspects.Eventually,this paper introduces the research progress of mixed-system electrified railways and traction power supply technologies without catenary system,speculates on the future development trends and challenges of TPSs and predicts that TPSs will be based on the continuous power supply mode,employing power electronic equipment and intelligent information technology to construct a railway comprehensive energy system with renewable energy.

Energy Saving and Emission Reduction Estimations of Electrified Railways in China

Based on the annual production data collected by the Statistic Center of the Ministry of Railways of the People＇s Republic of China, we calculated the energy saving and direct emission reductions of CO2, soot, SO2, CO, NOx and CnHm of electrified railways, and analyzed their dynamic characteristics during the period of 1975 2007. The results show that during this period, the annual mean values of energy saving is 1.23×10^6 tce, and direct emission reduction of CO2, soot, SO2, CO, NOx and CnHm are 4.267×10^6 t, 20.5×10^3 t, 3.0×10^3 t, 9.6×10^3 t, 67.9×10^3 t, and 6.9×10^3 t per year, respectively. The annual average increasing rates of energy saving is 139×10^3 tce, and direct emission reduction of CO2, soot, SO2, CO, NOx and CnHm are 483×10^3 t, 2.3×10^3 t, 0.34×10^3 t, 1.1×10^3 t, 7.7 ×10^3 t and 0.78×10^3 t per year, respectively. The electrified railways have played an important role in decreasing the energy consumption and air pollutant emissions of China＇s railway system. The results of this study could provide some reference knowledge for future reductions of energy consumption and waste gas emission in China＇s railway transportation.

Hybrid compensation method for traction power quality compensators in electrified railway power supply system

In order to improve the Power Quality(PQ)of traction power supply system and reduce the power rating and operation cost of compensator,a Static VAR Compensator(SVC)integrated Railway Power Conditioner(RPC)is presented in this paper.RPC is a widely used device in the AC electrified railway systems to enhance the PQ indices of the main network.The next generation of this equipment is Active Power Quality Compensator(APQC).The major concern of these compensators is their high kVA rating.In this paper,a hybrid technique is proposed to solve aforementioned problems.A combination of SVC as an auxiliary device is employed together with the main compensators,i.e.,RPC and APQC that leads on to the reduction of power rating of the main compensators.The use of proposed scheme will cause to reduce significantly the initial investment cost of compensation system.The main compensators are only utilized to balance active powers of two adjacent feeder sections and suppress harmonic currents.The SVCs are used to compensate reactive power and suppress the third and fifth harmonic currents.In this paper firstly,the PQ compensation procedure in AC electrified railway is analyzed step by step.Then,the control strategies for SVC and the main compensators are presented.Finally,a simulation is fulfilled using Matlab/Simulink software to verify the effectiveness and validity of the proposed scheme and compensation strategy and also demonstrate that this technique could compensate all PQ problems.

Scheme of long distance power supply for electrified railway traction network based on traction cable

Purpose–The traction cable is paralleled with the existing traction network of electrified railway through transverse connecting line to form the scheme of long distance power supply for the traction network.This paper aims to study the scheme composition and power supply distance(PSD)of the scheme.Design/methodology/approach–Based on the structure of parallel traction network(referred to as“cable traction network(CTN)”),the power supply modes(PSMs)are divided into cableþdirect PSM and cableþautotransformer(AT)PSM(including Japanese mode,French mode and new mode).Taking cableþJapanese AT PSM as an example,the scheme of long distance power supply for CTN under the PSMs of co-phase and out-of-phase power supply are designed.On the basis of establishing the equivalent circuit model and the chain circuit model of CTN,taking the train working voltage as the constraint condition,and based on the power flow calculation of multiple train loads,the calculation formula and process for determining the PSD of CTN are given.The impedance and PSD of CTN under the cableþAT PSM are simulated and analyzed,and a certain line is taken as an example to compare the scheme design.Findings–Results show that the equivalent impedance of CTN under the cableþAT PSM is smaller,and the PSD is about 2.5 times of that under the AT PSM,which can effectively increase the PSD and the flexibility of external power supply location.Originality/value–The research content can effectively improve the PSD of traction power supply system and has important reference value for the engineering application of the scheme.

A preventive opportunistic maintenance method for railway traction power supply system based on equipment reliability

Conventional maintenance mode for the traction power supply system(TPSS)is to perform scheduled regular maintenance activities for power supply equipment,while such maintenance mode may result in undue maintenance tasks and low efficiency due to different degradation processes of different sorts of equipment.To address this problem,this paper introduces a preventive opportunistic maintenance(POM)method for TPSS based on equipment reliability.Firstly,a POM model is established by considering the equipment reliability degradation process based on Weibull distribution.Then,by considering the total power outage time in the planned operation cycle of TPSS as the optimization objective,the optimal maintenance scheme of TPSS is formulated by iterative method of maintenance strategies.The proposed method is verified by introducing practical maintenance strategies and fault record data of the traction transformer,circuit breaker and disconnector in an actual TPSS of a railway administration.Results show that the presented method can make full use of the existing fault data to develop a POM scheme for TPSS.It can improve maintenance efficiency and reduce power outage time,providing guidance to formulate scientific maintenance strategies for TPSS.

Analysis of Power Supply Interference of Geomagnetic Second Data Observation-Take Changli Seismic Station as An Example

This paper analyzes two types of power supply interference encountered in the observation of geomagnetic second data: the HVDC interference and the discharge interference of electrified railway. By taking the FGM fluxgate magnetometer of Changli Seismic Station as the research object,we analyze interference characteristics and conduct intensive observational experiment of electrified railway interference.Finally,several conclusions are obtained:(1) HVDC interference is closely related to the changes in the current system of the interference source,such as current size,distance or orientation of the interference source. Although the characteristics of each change are not the same, the main changes are variable.(2) The discharge phenomenon caused by the contact of the pantograph system or other reasons during the operation of the electrified railway is a factor that may cause random small interference in the geomagnetic second data at Changli Seismic Station. This study explains similar phenomena discovered in previous years and meanwhile correct previous misjudgments including unstable working systems,unstable power supply,and occasional sudden jumps that are considered to be discrete.

Improved fault location method for AT traction power network based on EMU load test

The autotransformer(AT)neutral current ratio method is widely used for fault location in the AT traction power network.With the development of high-speed electrified railways,a large number of data show that the relation between the AT neutral current ratio and the distance from the beginning of the fault AT section to the fault point(Q-L relation)is mostly nonlinear.Therefore,the linear Q-L relation in the traditional fault location method always leads to large errors.To solve this problem,a large number of load-related current data that can be used to describe the Q-L relation are obtained through the load test of the electric multiple unit(EMU).Thus,an improved fault location method based on the back propagation(BP)neural network is proposed in this paper.On this basis,a comparison between the improved method and the traditional method shows that the maximum absolute error and the average absolute error of the improved method are 0.651 km and 0.334 km lower than those of the traditional method,respectively,which demonstrates that the improved method can effectively eliminate the influence of nonlinear factors and greatly improve the accuracy of fault location for the AT traction power network.Finally,combined with a shortcircuit test,the accuracy of the improved method is verified.

Investigation of Shunt Active Power Filters in Railway Systems, Substation Installation

This paper investigates the performance of SAPFs （shunt active power filters） which are introduced in order to address the quality issues in electrified railway supply systems. These filters can be installed at either the S/S （substation） end or at the SP （sectioning post） of the railway feeding power system. In this investigation novel control algorithms, based on the synchronously rotating frame of reference, are proposed for the case when the SAPF is installed at the substation end and its performance is assessed. The effectiveness of the proposed control algorithms are illustrated via Matlab/SimPower computer simulations and validated via comparisons with other publications. This investigation demonstrated that when the SAPF is installed at the substation side, it can effectively compensate for the higher harmonic supply current. In addition, the reactive power demand is fully compensated for, leading to close to unity power factor. However, the voltage drop/sag at the locomotive power supply feed point is only partially compensated for.

Review of pantograph and catenary interaction

The application of electrified railway directly promotes relevant studies on pantograph-catenary interac- tion. With the increase of train running speed, the operating conditions for pantograph and catenary have become increasingly complex. This paper reviews the related achievements contributed by groups and institutions around the world. This article specifically focuses on three aspects： The dynamic characteristics of the panto- graph and catenary components, the systems＇ dynamic properties, and the environmental influences on the pantograph-catenary interaction. In accordance with the existing studies, future research may prioritize the task of identifying the mechanism of contact force variation. This kind of study can be carried out by simplifying the pantograph-catenary interaction into a moving load problem and utilizing the theory of matching mechanical impedance. In addition, developing a computational platform that accommodates environmental interferences and multi-field coupling effects is necessary in order to further explore applications based on fundamental studies.