Mitigation of Stray Current Interference from DC Electric Railroad(3) Stray Current Confinement Method

직류전기철도의 누설전류 간섭대책(3) 누설전류 포집시스템

For over 25 years, the stray currents from DC electric railroads have caused serious interference problems with underground metallic infrastructures in Korea. The most serious interference is reported at the pipelines near the depot areas. Our field survey proves that this phenomena is mainly due to the missing of dedicated rectifiers for mainline, depot and/or workshop areas. Because it takes so much time and costs too much to replace the traction power system, we consider a stray current confinement method which collects the stray currents and drains them to the negative terminal of the rectifier. This can be realized by installing a stray current collecting wire along the depot boundary. Moreover, we found the stray current collecting reinforcement bar located beneath the rails of concrete slab tracks. Using this bar, we arc going to draing the stray currents from mainline rails. In this paper we show the result of field survey on railroad facilities and present the stray current confinement method under field test.