back to article China begins work on world-beating MEGA power cables

China’s apparently unceasing efforts to lead the world in every conceivable field continued on Sunday after engineers in the western region of Xinjiang began construction of what is claimed will be the largest capacity power line on the planet. The 800 kilovolt (kv) ultra-high voltage power transmission line is being built by …

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  1. frank ly
    Meh

    Power Calcs

    I make this an average continuous power delivery of 4.2 GW. I assume the 'world beating capacity' of 8 GW is because of a factor of two margin in the design?

    How does this compare to other notable power transmission systems?

    (Am I the only one who thinks that '37 billion kWh per year' is a clumsy way of expressing energy units?)

    1. Horridbloke
      Headmaster

      Re: Power Calcs

      I think '37 billion kWh per year' is actually a clumsy way of expressing power.

      1. JBR

        Re: Power Calcs

        kW=power

        kWh=power used

        Reg unit required?

        1. Dark haired lord of the undercliff
          Boffin

          Re: Power Calcs

          @JBR

          kW = power

          kWh = energy

          since Watt = joules/second you are dividing energy by time then re-multiplying it by time.

          madness i say madness.

          just stick to Joules and Watts much easier...

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Power Calcs

          kWh = Energy not power

        3. Mike Flex

          Re: Power Calcs

          > kWh=power used

          = Energy. More specifically:

          1,000 W x 3,600 seconds/hr = 3.6 MJ

    2. Chris Miller

      Re: Power Calcs

      I think what's being said (rather inelegantly) is that the line has a capacity of 8GW, with an average annual utilisation of just over 50%.

    3. Ken Hagan Gold badge
      Unhappy

      Re: Power Calcs

      Whilst we're here, 8 million kW is a clumsy way of writing 8GW.

      My guess is that whoever wrote the English-language press release doesn't actually know what a gigawatt is. That's fair enough, I suppose. I haven't a clue what it is in Chinese. If only there was a "tech news" website which aggregated all these press releases and rewrote them with the proper engineering terminology...

    4. Mike Flex

      Re: Power Calcs

      > I make this an average continuous power delivery of 4.2 GW.

      Phew, so did I.

      >(Am I the only one who thinks that '37 billion kWh per year' is a clumsy way of expressing energy units?)

      No.

  2. AliJ
    Boffin

    More than enough...

    ... to power a couple of Flux Capacitors then

    1. Richard 81

      Re: More than enough...

      4.2 gigawatts! 4.2 gigawatts. Great Scott!

      1. LinkOfHyrule
        Paris Hilton

        Re: More than enough...

        What's that in PEU (Paris Equivalent Units) then? 4.2 Jugawatts?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: More than enough...

          " What's that in PEU (Paris Equivalent Units) then? 4.2 Jugawatts?"

          Petahamsters?

          1. LinkOfHyrule

            Re: More than enough...

            PETAHampsters? I take it that's a new PETA breakaway movement devoted solely to destroying Freddie Starr?

            1. Fred Flintstone Gold badge

              Re: More than enough...

              Hamsters and breakaway makes me think of Richard Gere.

              I seriously need to get some coffee..

            2. Dire Critic
              Headmaster

              Re: More than enough...

              Having worked for The Hamsters for more than 15 years I can state quite categorically that there's NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

              Sorry, just a long-time irk. I feel slightly better now.

              1. LinkOfHyrule
                Thumb Up

                NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                Don't apologise matey! I have seriously improved my spelling thanks to the grammar Nazis here in these forums! No P in Hamster - got it! Will add that to no ' in 1980s.

                People like you provide a valuable service to those of us unfortunate enough to be educated under a combination of Thatcher, Major and Blair!

                1. Chris Miller

                  Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                  Except that there can be - it's a (secondary) alternate spelling.

                  1. Dire Critic
                    Headmaster

                    Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                    "Except that there can be - it's a (secondary) alternate spelling."

                    Not in any dictionary I know of.

                2. qwertyuiop
                  Happy

                  Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                  ...and in the right situation there *could* be an apostrophe in "1980s"

                  1. Dire Critic
                    Headmaster

                    Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                    ...and in the right situation there *could* be an apostrophe in "1980s"

                    Only to clarify an ambiguous meaning or if it's possessive.

                    Or, of course, if one is a greengrocer.

                    1. LinkOfHyrule
                      Thumb Up

                      Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                      Blimey - you learn something new everyday - firstly that you can have 's and Ps and secondly that sometimes grammar Nazis do actually talk out of their arses after-all!

                      It's good to have a second opinion - thanks guys!

                      I have completely forgotten what the original point of this thread was now!

                      1. LinkOfHyrule
                        Coat

                        I'm doing a Columbo here...

                        ...Just one more thing - dose anybody else agree this thread is a contender for El Reg's "most off-topic forum thread" award? If so what do we win?

                        Mine the grubby flasher's mac.

                        1. Anonymous Coward
                          Anonymous Coward

                          El Reg Alternative Units

                          A hamster is reasonably capable of 0.15 Watts, and assuming a hamster can only be relied on to run for 3 hours a day... by my calculations (i.e. 1 Watt = 53.33 Hamsters) the El Reg Alternative Unit measurement here would be:

                          0.224 Terahamsters

                          1. Fred Flintstone Gold badge
                            Coffee/keyboard

                            Terahamsters is..

                            .. so totally, totally epic it deserves an award. Seriously. I think my recently partially mended ribs have just snapped again - worse, I need a new keyboard now. Bwahahahaha...

                      2. Dire Critic
                        Trollface

                        Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                        "Blimey - you learn something new everyday - firstly that you can have 's and Ps and secondly that sometimes grammar Nazis do actually talk out of their arses after-all!"

                        Don't believe everything some stranger may tell you.

                        1. LinkOfHyrule
                          Gimp

                          Re: NO FUCKING P IN HAMSTER!!!!!

                          Damn I'm probably guna be offered sweets and kidnapped by some of you lot at this rate! Taken back to your secrete underground, tin foil lined, tech dungeon! Damn stranger danger getting me into trouble again!!!!!

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Russians tried a 1MV delivery system nearly 20 years ago

    Russians tried a 1MV delivery system nearly 20 years ago from Ekibastuz to the European part of the USSR. It was trumpeted very loud and there were even articles describing the designs in their pop-sci magazines (Nauka i Zhizn if memory serves me right).

    IIRC, end of the day it was not worth it so they ended up running a couple of 600Kv (which is their de-facto large capacity standard anyway). I may be wrong of course.

    In any case - this is _NOT_ earth shattering, it is the usual "Chinese copy Russian or Western tech at reduced capacity and claim world first".

    1. Wilseus
      Go

      Re: Russians tried a 1MV delivery system nearly 20 years ago

      I remember that. In fact as soon as I started reading this article I thought, "didn't the Russians build a 1MV power line quite some years ago?"

    2. clanger9
      Thumb Up

      Re: Russians tried a 1MV delivery system nearly 20 years ago

      This is a DC line - it's capable of transporting massive amounts of power with low losses and on relatively compact lines.

      The Russian 1MV test line was AC. It had massive losses and the towers were absolutely frickin' enormous. I don't think it's still in service.

      This is news; no-one has deployed 800kV DC commercially before. This is a fairly epic bit of electrical and mechanical engineering. IIRC, the valve stacks alone are about 60m high...

  4. Christian Berger

    It's kV not kv, BTW

    The unit sign for volt is the upper-case V, not the lower-case v.

    1. Daniel Evans

      Re: It's kV not kv, BTW

      Ah, someone got there before I did. Glad I'm not the only one who knows their units!

  5. Duncan Macdonald

    Not that high power

    A standard dual circuit 3 phase 4 conductor 400kV line as used in the main transmission lines in the UK can carry 1kA per conductor for a total power of over 6.7GW. The China link is high voltage but not very high power given the voltage.

    The high voltage is probably to reduce the amount of aluminum (or copper) needed for the line (doubling the voltage halves the amount of conductor needed).

    1. PyLETS

      Re: Not that high power

      Very long distance though. If you use cable materials whose cost is linearly proportional to distance, losses will also be linearly proportional. If your transformers (and rectifiers if DC is used) can handle higher voltages, and if this didn't lose more energy through corona discharge, doubling the voltage would quadruple the capacity of the line without increasing losses which are proportional to current.

      Anyone here with expertise about the effect of corona discharges in electric transmission line designs ?

    2. dssf

      Re: Not that high power

      Might be pretty good at thwarting copper thieves, too, no? A would-be-copper-theif-inverted-ito-a-crispy-critter every 200 km might cast the country into a time-warping brownout, hehehe.... Unless these things are very, very buried....

      If any get to within the dam-burst zones of the Three Gorges Dams, and got flooded, what might that do to the system overall? Would breakers (or their equivalent devices) be tripping all over the country? IF hey have bad luck restoring power at night, that side of the Globe might look like a bicyclist's strobe to any *nauts who happen to be flying over (assuming the light show penetrates any then-current pollution).

      But, it got me wondering whether this is a backdoor prototype for Blue Energy (lol!), to energize a Project Genesis.

      Seriously, could this be tapped in to by nuclear reactors later if that 2 trillion tons of coal reserves gets sucked up or is so toxic that burning it becomes untenable? What kind of conversion systems would be candidates to supplant coal plants if/when it becomes necessary?

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Long history

    Wiki has a list of HVDC projects

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HVDC_projects

    1. Richard Ball

      Re: Long history

      Is it DC? I was wondering this, and didn't see it in the report.

      Always intrigued by thoughts of mahoosive transistors / valves / mercury rectifiers / whatever they use to tie into HVDC lines.

      1. peter wegrzyn

        Re: Long history

        Yes, its DC at very high voltage, you then only get loses of around 1% per 1000km

      2. Christian Berger

        Re: Long history

        I don't think they use any of those. As far as I know they use thyristors.

  7. Dire Critic
    Headmaster

    It doesn't bode well...

    ...when they can't even spell sulphur correctly.

    1. Soruk
      Unhappy

      Re: It doesn't bode well...

      I know how you feel (I also use the suplhur spelling), but unfortunately Merkin influence got in the way and the IUPAC went and ratified the "sulfur" spelling.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It doesn't bode well...

        It's okay - we won the aluminium/aluminum war at the IUPAC.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: It doesn't bode well...

      still, better than most peoples cantonese on these forums.

      1. Allan George Dyer
        Coat

        Re: It doesn't bode well...

        and their mandarin (putonghua), which is likely to be more relevant.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: It doesn't bode well...

          没错!

          虽然中国文字是一样的,我相信

          1. Half a metric tonne

            Re: It doesn't bode well...

            Re:

            没错!

            虽然中国文字是一样的,我相信

            Sometimes it is, sometimes not.

          2. Allan George Dyer
            Holmes

            Re: It doesn't bode well...

            Re: "沒錯!

            雖然中國文字是一樣的,我相信"

            Traditionally, yes, but simply, no.

  8. Michael 28
    Alert

    Corona discharge?

    Assuming it's not buried underground, this would sound EEvil in the rain!

  9. KBeee

    Higher voltage reduces transmission losses (at the cost of greater clearance distances/insulators), which probably explains where the

    "We can reduce 317,000 tons of sulfur dioxide and 267,000 tons of nitrogen oxide which would otherwise be produced during the transportation," quote comes from, though without stating what this is compared to, these figures are meaningless - 800kV Vs. 400kV? 800kV Vs. 1000V?

  10. Tony Barnes
    Thumb Up

    Anyone else notice the timescales here?

    Work started on Sunday, they aim to be complete in 2014. Lets assume they've 'only' aiming for a 2 year turnaround - 1373 miles in 2 years, 1373 / (365 * 2) = 1.88 m/d

    That's nearly 2 miles a day that will be completed. Underground, or over ground, that seems like a pretty damn impressive daily goal.

    I'm guessing in the UK we still work in yards per day on a project such as this...?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Anyone else notice the timescales here?

      Building roads and power lines are the kind of public works projects that are easily parallelizable, so while they may do two miles a day on average, its not like there will be one team that makes two miles of progress every day starting on one end and moving linearly to the other.

      There's enough people there, enough resources/manufacturing capacity, and more importantly so little red tape in a command economy that they could probably finish it this fall if they really wanted to...

  11. Darryl
    Joke

    Finally!

    Now maybe you can get a decent recharge time on your brand-new electric car!

  12. Dave 32
    Thumb Up

    Power LIne

    It would be interesting to see the details on the cable for such a project. Western designs usually use spatially separated lines to suppress the corona. Since the corona is dependent upon the electric field, and the electric field is dependent upon the voltage as well as the shape of the conductor, the corona can be reduced by minimizing sharp edges, and maximizing the radius of the conductor. Since it's not practical to suspend a 12 inch diameter conductor, the conductor's diameter is approximated by using a number of smaller wires spatially separated to produce a 12 inch diameter grid (or thereabouts). Thus, the lines (per phase) on high voltage transmission lines, may consist of 2, 3, 4, or even more conductors, spaced apart, rather than a single conductor.

    Still, there will be substantial corona, especially in inclement weather conditions.

    I used to live near a 250KV AC (or thereabouts) transmission line, and when the fog rolled it, that thing would really sing (Loud enough to be heard several hundred feet away!).

    One wonders how much x-ray radiation is produced by the corona from such a power line? Has anyone ever done any studies?

    Insulators will also be a bit of a trick. The voltage isn't divided equally across all of the sections. Thus, non-uniform insulator stacks may be required. Complicating the design will be accounting for moisture and/or dirt, which may further alter the voltage division across sections. And, excessive voltage across a section can lead to breakdown, resulting in arcing, heating, and rapid failure.

    For that matter, even a tiny air bubble in a ceramic/glass insulator can result in breakdowns at high voltages, resulting in heating and shattering of the insulator.

    In any case, it's sure to be a challenging project, and the engineers responsible should be credited with an outstanding design (if it works).

    Dave

    1. clanger9
      Thumb Up

      Re: Power LIne

      You're right, the engineering challenges are enormous. Plenty of corona discharge in the wet!

      Exposed UHV DC makes a really strange hissing/sizzling sound, quite unlike the heavy crackle/buzz you get on AC stuff.

      One big problem is the long-term stability of DC insulators - they tend to degrade over time as the ions all move in one direction. AC is much easier to do in this respect.

      No x-rays, though: AFAIK you need a vacuum to generate those...

  13. Christian Berger

    What I'm actually more impressed by

    Have you ever seen this solar power plant near Vienna?

    http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Wien_erdkabelstation_400kV_Nordeinspeisung.jpg

    Just a tiny solar panel between the 2nd and 3rd while concrete column (from the left) giving enough energy to call for a 400kV line going to it.

  14. dssf

    Worry not, people. Anna's best engineers are on the ball. Coronas and rain will be Red Rain, to rejuvenate dead forests, cure diseases....

    (hehehe)

  15. Sirius Lee

    Move the industry west?

    I know this power transmission is endlessly fascinating and a great engineering challenge but wouldn't it be easier to move industry west a bit? Is the west of China so awful that no one wants to live there (except power generation engineers apparently)?

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