ABB has announced the development of its high voltage direct current circuit breaker. It combines very fast mechanics with power electronics, and will be capable of ‘interrupting’ power flows equivalent to the output of a large power station within 5 milliseconds- that is thirty times faster than the blink of a human eye.

On this clip on youtube, a simple and brief description of the operation of this breaker is shown. On an interview Claes Rytoft, head of technology in ABB’s Power Systems division explains how this development is groundbreaking. For a few years power electronics were used for DC power flow interruption. The drawback was the high power losses and now ABB has combined the power electronic breaker functionality with a mechanical breaker, thereby lower the losses and increasing the speed.

This means hopefully in near future we can see DC grids, so far we mainly have point to point DC lines. This can add to the security and reliability of the whole power network.