Prof. Dr. Christian Franck

Research area

The role of electric energy will be central in the future energy system. Electric energy is not only the most superior form of energy to transport over long distances with low losses, it is also often directly produced (wind, PV). Moreover, it is the form of energy that is most flexible for use and easily controllable. Increases in efficiency are often achieved by changing to electric energy (e.g. oil or gas fired heating to heat pumps or petrol driven cars to electric vehicles).

The research and teaching focus of the High Voltage Laboratory is in the area of “technologies for future electric power transmission systems”. Focus areas are: 1.  High Voltage Gaseous Insulation Systems, 2. Future Overhead Power Transmission Lines, 3. High Voltage Solid Insulation, and 4. Current Interruption. Our project topics are the search for insulation gasmixtures alternatives to SF6, HVDC and mixed-frequency solid insulation systems, hybrid AC-DC overhead power lines, corona inception and mitigation, and experimental studies to characterize and optimize switching arcs for HVDC circuit breakers and SF6-free breakers.

By systematically introducing the latest experimental and numerical methods, we advance the research in the classical area of high voltage engineering; an area where some of the research questions have a long history of investigation but are still not answered completely satisfying. The driver for our research is to use conceptually different research approaches in the projects. This differentiates us from others working in similar areas of research and enables us not only to solve the investigated problems but also to gain a basic physical understanding of the involved processes. The research is done mainly experimentally, backed by multiphysics simulations that partially contain newly developed models.