Design of an Optimal Fibers-Supported Real-Time Distributed Temperature Sensing System for Power Cables

Local temperature abnormity is prone to lead to operational faults of power cables. The real-time distributed temperature sensing (DTS) toward power cables can discover the locations with temperature abnormity. Due to the characteristics of optical fibers that are not affected by electromagnetic interference, the optimal fibers-supported real-time DTS can be well suitable for power cables. Therefore, this paper proposes design of an optimal fibers-supported real-time DTS system for power cables. First, taking optical time-domain reflection and Raman scattering theory as the basis, Raman scattering-based optimal fiber temperature measurement method is introduced. Then, a system signal acquisition module and a data processing module are designed based on FPGA, thus building the hardware platform for optimal fibers-supported DTS system. Next, Verilog language is utilized to finish Qsys underlying design based on NIOS II soft-core processor. Hence, software environment compatible with the hardware platform is developed. Finally, the designed prototype system is adopted to construct a testing platform toward optimal fibers-supported real-time DTS system for power cables. The temperature monitoring effect of cables at a distance of 2[Formula: see text]km is tested through Ethernet media. The response time for a single measurement is about 1.2[Formula: see text]s.