Optimization of Ampacity for the Unequally Loaded

Power Cables in Duct Banks

ZHAO Jiankang LEI Qingquan FAN Youbing, Deng Xianbo,
State Grid Electric Power Research College of Electrical Electronic Liu Songhua
Institute, Engineering of Harbin University of State Grid Electric Power Research
Wuhan 430074, China Science and Technology Institute,
School of Electrical Engineering of Harbin 150040, China Wuhan 430074, China
Wuhan University
Wuhan 430072China

AbstractThis paper presents a method of the ampacity
optimization for power cables in duct banks under unequal loads.
The ampacities of power cables were calculated on the basis of
IEC 60287 standard, then the thermal field distribution of the
duct banks was computed by means of finite element
analysis(FEA). On this basis, an optimization method was
proposed to maximize the loading capacity of the cable group.
The ampacities and thermal fields under two optimization
layouts were recalculated and compared with the original layout.
The results showed that the thermal field can be improved
effectively and the ampacity can be increased remarkably by
appropriate layout optimization.
Keywords- ampacity, duct banks, unequal load, finite element,
optimization, power cable
Based on the two analytic methods, an optimization method
for the ampacity of the dissimilar cables in duct bank is
advanced, then this optimization method is used to optimize a
practical cable engineering in this paper.
II. PROJECT DESCRIPTION
In Wuhan urban, a project of power cable will be
performed. In this project, some power cable circuits will be
laid in a 46 duct bank.
Two plans are suggested for this project, which have five
and six circuits respectively. The layouts of the two plans are
shown in Fig.1. The corresponding cable types to every circuit
in the two plans are listed in Tab.1.

I. INTRODUCTION
Nowdays, extra high voltage power cable has been widely
used in the urban underground transmission system, and groups
of unequally loaded dissimilar cables laid in a duct bank is
popular, e.g. crossing the road, or connectting with a
substation. With the growth of the electric energy
consummation, the ampacity for the new installation of power
cables is very important, as well as for in operation. An
optimization should be performed to improve the ampacity of
the underground transmission cables at the design procedure to
meet the demand of higher reliability and lower cost.
(a)
The mutual heating effect caused by the other cables is a
major factor that affects the ampacity for the dissimilar cables
laid in a duct bank[1,2], which is mainly depend on the layout
of the cables. Up to now, few published literatures about the
ampacity for groups of unequally loaded dissimilar cables in a
duct bank can be found in China.
The IEC 60287 gives the method to assess the ampacity of
unequally loaded dissimilar cables laid in duct bank. This
method can give the exact value of ampacity. At present the
FEA also is widely applied to determine the temperature or
ampacity of the power cable circuit [3,4], which can overcome
limitations inherent in the analytical approach, and is very (b)
visible[5]. Figure 1. Layouts of the two plans for the project

(a) plan 1, (b) plan 2 respectively

978-1-4244-4813-5/10/$25.00 2010 IEEE

 TABLE I. TYPE OF THE POWER CABLES FOR THE PROJECT conductor temperature of every loop reaches or nears to its
Plan No. First plan Second Plan
maximum operation temperature [9].
1 64/110 11000 64/110 11000 B. Theoretical computation of thermal field using FEA
2 64/110 1400 64/110 1400
On the assumption that the length of the duct bank system
Circuit 3 64/110 11000 64/110 11000
No.
is much larger than the width, the problem becomes a 2-D field
4 127/220 12000 127/220 12000
analysis of the cross-section of the duct bank. In steady state,
5 127/220 12000 127/220 12000
6 No cable 127/220 12000
the heat diffusion equation of the duct bank system can be
Note: All the cables in Tab. 1 are XLPE insulation corrugated aluminum described as (4):
tape shield and PE oversheath with Cu conductor.
1 1 (4)
( )+ ( )=Q
In this project, the plan 1 is only for engineering reference x x y y
to designer. And how to increase the ampacities of 220 kV
circuits is more important than how to increase the ampacities Where:
of 110kV circuits.
: thermal resistivity of soil, Km/W
A. The Ampacity of the unequally load cables in duct bank
: temperature, K
The calculation method for group of unequally loaded
dissimilar cables is according to IEC 60287[6,7,8], which will Q: joule loss of cables, W/m3.
be briefly introduced below. The losses of the power cables include three parts: joule
The cable surface temperature rise caused by the other lose in the conductor, dielectric loss in the insulation and metal
cables must be considered in calculation procedure, for pth sheath loss caused by eddy current. Dielectric loss can be
single core cable in this pipe-group, that is, neglected according to IEC 60287. The loss of metal sheath is
equal into conductor according IEC 60853. The Cross-
Wd [0.5T1 + T2 + T3 + T4 ] p (1) sectional structural of a cable in duct is shown in Fig. 2.
I=
RT1 + R(1 + 1 )T2 + R(1 + 1 + 2 )(T3 + T4 )

Where, p is the conductor temperature rise above the

ambient temperature (K). Wd is dielectric losses per unit length
of the cable insulation (W/m). R is the ac resistance per unit
length of the conductor at maximum operating temperature
(ohm/m). T1 is the thermal resistance per unit length between
one conductor and the metal sheath (Km/W). T2 is the thermal Figure 2. Cross-sectional structural of a cable in duct
resistance per unit length between sheath and armor (Km/W).
T3 is the thermal resistance per unit length between outer The thermal conductivities of materials in the model is
sheath and surrounding (Km/W). T4 is the thermal resistance adopted from IEC 60287. The thermal resistivities of the soil
per unit length between the cable surface and the surrounding and sand both are 1.0 Km/W considering the actual situation.
medium, it is the same as the isolated cable underground cable, The convection and radiation effect of the air-cable and air-
and the outer diameter is the outer diameter of the pipe ground boundary conditions are included in the thermal
(Km/W). 1, 2 are the sheath and armor loss factors. anlysis.

The temperature rise p at the surface of the pth cable
caused by the other (q-1) cables in pipe-group can be derived
from the expression:
p = 1 p + 2 p + " + kp + " qp (2)
Where, p is the temperature rise at the surface of the
cable produced by the power Wk watt per unit length dissipated
in cable k:
Mesh: The model is meshed with different element sizes in
different regions. The adjacent regions of the cables are
meshed with smaller element size to guarantee computation
precision of thermal field. Other regions are meshed with larger
element size to increases computational efficiency. The meshed
model is shown in Fig. 3.

1 d' (3)
kp = TWk ln( pk )
2 d pk

dpk, dpk is respectively represent the distance of the centre

of the pth cable to the centre of the cable k and to the centre of
the reflection of the cable k in the ground-air surface.
Figure 3. Meshed model for the duct banks
The procedure is iterative in nature. An initial value of the
power dissipated per unit length of each cable must be given, Boundary conditions: The top boundary is the interface of
then an iterative procedure is performed until the maximum air and soil where cables are buried. The top boundary is
modeled as a convective heat transfer surface and considered
as an isotherm of 25. The bottom boundary 3m under the B. Laying Optimization
cable group is an isotherm of 25. Based on the results of the previous analysis, two
optimization methods are advanced aimed at the 2nd project.
III. CALCULATION AND RESULTS The layouts of the optimization methods are shown in Fig.5.
This paper elaborates on calculation of the ampacity for the
project including the two optimization layout methods. And the
corresponding thermal field computation are also performed in
this section.
A. Calculation of ampacity
The ampacities of the transmission cable circuits for the
two plans are shown in table 2.

TABLE II. AMPACITY UNDER THE ORIGINAL LAYING METHODS

Figure 5. Layout Optimization methods for plan 2
Circuit
1 2 3 4 5 6
No. Tab.3 gives the ampacity for optimization methods which
Plan 1 823 547 613 913 977 are shown in Fig.5. As a comparison, the ampacity for the
Plan 2 769 471 558 740 857 765 original method showed in Fig.1(b) is also given in Tab.3.
Unit: A

The corresponding thermal field maps of the duct bank for TABLE III. AMPACITY FOR THE OPTIMIZATION MEHTODS
the above two plans are shown in Fig. 4. Circuit Laying method
number Original Method 1 Method 2
1 769 859 815
2 471 529 498
3 558 572 602
4 740 751 814
5 765 767 818
6 857 862 907
Unit: A

Tab.3 shows that the two optimization methods can

improve the ampacity of all the power cable in this duct banks.
When the circuits are laid by method 1, the ampacity for 110
(a) kV circuits are greatly increased, but for the 220 kV circuit, the
amapcity is hardly increased. For example, the minimum
increment of 110 kV circuits is 14A, about 2.5% of the
ampacity when laid in original method, corresponding to 3rd
circuit. While the maximum increment of 220 kV circuits is
11A, about 1.5% of the ampacity when laid in original
method , corresponding to 4th circuit. When the circuits are laid
by method 2, the ampacity for all circuits are greatly increased,
especially for 220 kV circuits.

(b) Fig.6 gives the load capacity of the 110kV, 220kV and the
whole power cable system when laid by different laying
Figure 4. Thermal fields of the duct banks under the original laying methods methods.
(a) plan 1, (b) plan 2 respectively
1500 1335.1
1245.11283.1
Load Capacity MVA

A clear temperature map of the duct bank can be obtained

from thermal filed computation. The hotspot can be easily 899.9 906.8
967.4
1000
found from the temperature map, which is useful to optimize
the layout of the duct bank.
For plan 2, the thermal field which is shown in figure 4(b), 500 345.2 376.3 367.7
is more critical than that of plan 1. The heat focuses in the
bottom of duct banks where the 220 kV power cable circuits
0
are laid. And the top of the duct banks is not fully utilized.
110 kV system 220 kV system whole
original method 1 method 2
Figure 6. Load Capacity of power cable in the duct banks
 For 110 kV circuits, the method 1 can more effectively
increase the load capacity than method 2. While for 220 kV
circuits, the method 2 can more effectively increase the load
capacity than method 1. For the whole power cable system in
the duct bank, the total load capacity when laid by optimization
method 2 is 104.1% of the load capacity when laid by
optimization method 1. The effectiveness for the optimization
method 2 can also be demonstrated by comparison of thermal
field between the two layouts, as will be shown below.
C. Thermal filed of optimization laying methods
Figure 7 shows the thermal field of the duct bank with the
two optimization methods.
(a)
(b)
Figure 7. Temperature gradient of the duct banks by optimal method
(a) method 1, (b) method 2 respectively
A comparison between Fig. 4b and Fig.7a, Fig.7b is
performed, and the results show that the thermal field in Fig.7b
is the most even among Fig.4b, Fig.7a and Fig.7b. And the
hotspot of the temperature above 50 in Fig.7b is the smallest,
which can better keep the thermal stability of the soil and
backfill sands.
Comparison between Fig.7a and Fig. 7b shows that
optimization method 2 is better at improving the thermal field
of the whole duct bank than optimization method 1, especially
for 220kV circuits in the bottom.
The results also show that the method 2 is the best method
for optimization of the project. Based on the above analysis,
the optimization method 2 is recommended to lay the six power
cable circuits.
IV. CONCLUSION
An optimal method has been advanced to optimize the
layout of the power cables in the duct banks. The optimization
method is based on theoretic calculation and FEA thermal field
computation. By this method, the maximum load capacity of
the duct bank system is easily achieved.
From the thermal field map, the hotspot of the duct banks
can be easily removed. This method is quite simple and
visualizable, and is useful for the design of the power cable
circuits, which will assure the reliability and economy of the
power cable circuits.
REFERENCES
[1] Fan, Youbin, Meng Shaoxin, Miao Fugui. Calculation of current rating
for medium and low voltage XLPE cable in clustered layout[C],
Conference on Electrical Insulation and Dielectric Phenomena2008
122-124.
[2] ZHAO Jiankang, JIANG Yun, YANG Liming, Experimental Research
for the Current Rating of Medium and Low Voltage XLPE Cables in
Cluster Laying[J], High Voltage Engineering, 2005,31(10)55-58.
[3] D.J. Swaffield, P.L. Lewinl, M. LeBlanc Investigation into the
conservatism of high voltage cable rating methods: A comparison
between IEC60287 and Finite Element Analysis[C]Proceedings of the
XIVth International Symposium on High Voltage Engineering,
2005:123-126.
[4] Liang Yongchun, Li Yanming, Chai JinaiA New Method to Calculate
the Steady-State Temperature Field and Ampacity of Underground
Cable System[J], Transcations of China Electrotechnical Society,
2007,22(8):185-190
[5] C.C. Hwang , J.J. Chang, H.Y. Chen. Calculation of ampacities for
cables in trays using finite elements[J], Electric Power Systems
Research, 2000(54): 7581.
[6] IEC 60287-1-1. Electric cables Calculation of the current rating Part
1-1: Current rating equations (100 % load factor) and calculation of
losses General [S].2006.
[7] IEC 60287-1-2.. Electric Cables - Calculation of the Current Rating -
Part 1: Current Rating Equations (100% Load Factor) and Calculation of
Losses - Section 2: Sheath Eddy Current Loss Factors for Two Circuits
in Flat Formation [S]. 2006
[8] IEC 60287-2-1, Electric cables - Calculation of the current rating - Part
2-1: Thermal resistance - Calculation of thermal resistance [S]2006
[9] NIU Haiqing, WANG Xiaobing, ZHANG Yao. Study of Ampacity of
Single-core Cable Based on Iterative Method[J]. High Voltage
Engineering, 2006, 32(11):41-44.