Covering the food & beverage industry, beauty, fashion, retail markets, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs and related people and entities worldwide
HD Hyundai Electric builds Korea’s largest eco-friendly transformer
HD Hyundai Electric's new transfomer uses synthetic ester oil, an insulating oil environmentally safer than conventional mineral oil. Courtesy of HD Hyundai Electric
By Ko Dong-hwan
Major electric machinery and equipment developer HD Hyundai Electric has successfully developed a transformer running on an environmentally cleaner oil than a conventional one in the largest capacity ever in the industry here.
The HD Hyundai subsidiary said Thursday the accomplished product will head to a substation in the United Kingdom operated by National Grid, a local utility company.
The transformer, 400 kilovolt and 460 megavolt-amperes, uses synthetic ester oil as an insulator oil against heat and electricity. The company said the new oil is highly biodegradable, making itself more environmentally sustainable than conventionally used mineral oil.
Synthetic ester oil, compared to mineral oil, has a higher flash point and helps reduce risks of fire, according to the company. It added that at times of oil leak, synthetic ester oil’s environmental impact is relatively low, making it suitable for sites where both fire safety and environmental protection are required.
Transformers that use eco-friendly insulating oils need different design requirements from conventional products, making them more difficult to manufacture, HD Hyundai Electric said. The difficulty derives from the machine’s characteristics in operation that when voltage and capacity increase, heat control and insulation become more difficult to achieve.
It is why developing transformers relying on oil insulation with less environmental tolls entails greater technical complexity. The company said only a few number of companies worldwide are currently capable of producing such products.
HD Hyundai’s latest transformer comes as demand for eco-friendly transformers rises worldwide, the company said. Citing market research firm Grand View Research, the company added that the global market for environmentally friendly transformers is projected to grow from $1.22 billion in 2024 to $1.81 billion by 2030, representing a compound annual growth rate of 6.9 percent.
“High-voltage, large-capacity transformers using eco-friendly insulating oil are highly advanced, technology-intensive products that require both insulation and cooling performance as well as reliability. We’ll continue to actively promote the expansion of the eco-friendly power equipment market through ongoing research and development," a HD Hyundai Electric official said.