The smoothing reactor is generally installed on the pole bus in plusmn500 kV HVDC system. It’s often used as ‘in the converter station, half of the smoothing reactance which is required is connected with pole bus while the rest gets connected with the neutral bus. They are typically installed in series in DC systems in order to reduce harmonic currents/transient overcurrents/current ripples.
You might not use one at home, but being an electrical engineer you would need one of these in the power station you work for. They are an essential part of any high voltage direct current systems and used to smooth the wave shape of the DC to reduce the loss of power and improve performance. Smoothing reactors are typically used in HVDC links and some other heavy industrial applications, such as variable speed drives UPS systems, traction systems, etc.
- They are used in inverters to reduce the alteration failure which is occurred due to AC voltage dips at the converter bus. They actually prevent consequent communication failures in inverters by reducing the rate of the rising direct current in the bridge when the direct voltage of another bridge collapses.
- They smooth down the ripple in the DC so that to prevent the current from getting discontinuous for light loads. In DC lines, they effectively decrease harmonic voltages and currents. Due to the discharge of shunt capacitances of the DC line, smoothing reactors are important to limit the current in the valves while the converter bypass pair operation.
OPERATING CONDITIONS
Location: indoor or outdoor
Ambient temperature: -40℃~+50℃ (according to customer’s requirement)
Altitude: ≤3000m (according to customer’s requirement)
Maximum wind speed: 45m/s (according to customer’s requirement)
Relative humidity: ≤90%
Seismic capacity: horizontal 0.30g (according to customer’s requirement)
Seismic capacity: Vertical 0.15g (according to customer’s requirement)
Note the type of ventilation when using indoor.
Installation location should strictly be clean and not having any electric conductivity, harmful gas, steam, and explosive dust.
Smoothing reactors are essentially installed and connected in the series rectifier and the entire load current smoothly flows through it. An important note, only the alternating current component is limited which simply means the loss of electricity is minimal. The utilization of electro-technical steel core allows reducing the magnetic losses and creating a notable inductance at smaller yet overall dimensions.
Many manufacturers are able to design and build a wide variety of DC smoothing reactors, while some can even provide both steel-core and air-core smoothing reactors for several different applications. Customers will always receive such reactors after diligent tests are done so that to ensure quality. Vibration tests, heavy ambient withstand, and light impulse tests are done to certify the quality of DCSR.