Real Case Study Assessment of Technical, Environmental, Social and Financial Benefits of Dry-Type Air Core Reactor Technology

This conservative model compares the first 550 kV single-tower dry-type air-core shunt reactor with conventional oil-immersed alternatives. The single-tower layout enables an equivalent footprint between technologies. However, capital expenditure is reduced, primarily due to lower civil works requirements, reduced structural mass, and simplified transportation and assembly. Also, operational expenditure is decreased by eliminating accessories, oil handling, periodic oil testing, leak prevention systems, and dedicated firefighting infrastructure, resulting in decreased maintenance effort and improved availability.

Besides, dry-type technology offers significant environmental and social benefits, including the elimination of oil-related contamination and fire risks. From a social perspective, the intrinsically safer configuration supports public acceptance in densely populated or environmentally sensitive areas. To quantify these multidisciplinary benefits at system level, a real-data-driven model based on Monte Carlo simulation was applied to the entire Brazilian fleet of high-voltage shunt reactors, capturing both deterministic and probabilistic uncertainties.

All analyses were implemented in a Python-based framework to ensure transparency and reproducibility. Overall, the results demonstrate that dry-type air-core technology deliver measurable, multi-dimensional life-cycle advantages in real-world transmission systems.