Strong and Weak Electric Fields Interfering: Capacitive Icing Detection and Capacitive Energy Harvesting on a 220 kV High-Voltage Overhead Power Line

This paper focuses on problems which arise when both a power-harvesting system based on a capacitive principle and a capacitive measurement device [i.e., a capacitance-to-digital converter (CDC)] are used in one electronic system to build up an autonomous measurement device for icing detection on a high-voltage overhead power line. The overall capacitance of the measurement circuitry between the conductor and the energy harvester shell must remain within a well-defined range to keep the energy-harvesting circuitry operational and to operate the CDC within its specifications. A decoupling solution for both the data path and the power supply unit has been implemented and verified experimentally in a high-voltage laboratory and a field test.