Electrical Insulating Materials

Electrical insulating materials are used in the manufacturing of electrical insulation

intended to cover the current conducting parts of electrical devices and to isolate the
parts maintained at different potentials. Electrical insulation is used to prevent the
flow of electric current through unwanted paths. In addition, insulating materials
serve as dielectrics in capacitors to provide for a definite capacitance of the capacitor.

Electrical Properties
Important electrical properties of electrical insulating materials are as follows:
i) Volume resistivity
ii) Surface resistivity
iii) Dielectric constant
iv) Dielectric Dissipation factor
v) Dielectric strength

 Volume Resistivity

Whenever an insulating material is exposed to an electric field some conduction takes

place through the volume of the material. In evaluating various insulating materials
for their volume conduction, the quantity volume resistivity () is used.

Fig.15 Determination of volume resistivity of a flat specimen

In the SI system, the volume resistivity () is equal to the resistance between the
opposite faces of a 1-meter cube of the material under study. For a flat specimen kept
in a uniform field, the volume resistivity in .m is determined from the formula

R A
 ….. (20)
t
where, R is the volume resistance of the specimen in , A is the electrode area in m2
and t is the thickness of the specimen in m, as shown in Fig. 15.

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  Surface Resistivity

For an insulating material in an electric field some conduction also takes place along
the surface of the material. The surface conduction of various insulating materials is
characterized by the quantity surface resistivity (s).

Fig.16 Determination of Surface resistivity: (a) for a flat specimen; (b) for a
cylindrical specimen

The surface resistivity is the resistance between the opposite edges of a square
specimen of any size along the surface of the material. The surface resistivity in  is
calculated by the formula
Rs d
s  ….. (21)
l
where, Rs is the resistance in  between two electrodes of width d in m, located on the
surface of the specimen and spaced at a distance l in m, as shown in Fig. 16(a).
In the case of a cylindrical specimen as shown in Fig. 16(b), the surface resistivity in
 is calculated by the formula
Rs 2r
s  ….. (22)
l
 Dielectric Constant

One of the most important dielectric characteristics widely used in electrical

engineering is the dielectric constant or permittivity (). This quantity is the ratio of
the electric charge a capacitor stores at a certain voltage impressed across its
electrodes separated by a given dielectric to the electric charge that could be
accumulated in a capacitor of the same electrode configuration at the same voltage,
but with vacuum as the dielectric.
At a given value of the applied voltage, the electric charge Q is the sum of the two
components: Q0 that would be stored on the electrodes if they were separated by a
vacuum, and Qd whose value depends on the polarization of an actual dielectric that
separates the electrodes, i.e.

Q  Q0  Qd ….. (23)

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Hence, according to the definition of permittivity

Q Q  Qd Q
   0  1 d ….. (24)
Q0 Q0 Q0
Again, it is well known that the electric charge of a capacitor is
Q  CV ….. (25)
where, C is the capacitance of the capacitor and V is the voltage impressed across its
electrodes.
Then, it may be written that,
Q  C V and Q0  C0 V ….. (26)

where, C0 is the capacitance of the capacitor with its electrodes separated by a

vacuum. Then, from Eqn.(24) it follows that

C
  ….. (27)
C0
It is evident from Eqn.(27) that the permittivity of a dielectric material can be
measured as the ratio of the capacitance of a capacitor with the given dielectric to the
capacitance of a capacitor with the same electrode configuration but having a vacuum
for its dielectric.

 Dielectric Dissipation Factor

The dielectric loss is the power dissipated in a dielectric as heat when the dielectric is
exposed to an electric field. This power loss occurs both with dc and ac voltages due
to conduction processes in a dielectric that cause leakage current. Since the dc voltage
does not induce polarization, the conduction in the dielectric is governed by the
volume and surface resistivities. With an ac voltage applied to a dielectric, it is
necessary to use some other characteristics to describe its quality, because in this case,
along with the leakage current conduction, a number of other mechanisms come into
play. The dielectric loss in an insulating material can be described by the power
dissipated per unit volume, called the specific loss.

Fig.17 Equivalent circuit and phasor diagram for a lossy capacitor

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Consider a capacitor with a lossy dielectric in an ac circuit. This capacitor is to be
represented by a circuit in such a way that the active power dissipated by the circuit
should be equal to the power dissipated in the capacitor dielectric, and the current
should lead the voltage by the same angle as that observed in the dielectric under
study. This equivalent circuit representation is done by replacing the lossy capacitor
by an ideal capacitor with a parallel-connected resistor, as shown in Fig. 17(a). It may
be mentioned here that such equivalent representation does not offer any explanation
of the mechanisms of dielectric losses.
It is known from the theory of alternating currents that the active power is
P  V I cos  ….. (28)
Using Eqn.(28) and the phasor diagram shown in Fig. 17(b),
G G
P  V . (VY ). as I  VY and cos  
Y Y
or , P  V 2G  V 2 B sin   V 2 B tan 
when  is small.

or, P  V 2 C p tan  ….. (29)

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and tan   ….. (30)
 CpR

 Dielectric Strength

Any dielectric can only be used at voltages for which the electric field intensities do
not exceed limiting values typical for the dielectric under definite conditions. If the
voltage increases to such a value that the electric field intensity goes beyond these
critical values, then the dielectric loses its insulating properties. This phenomenon is
known as dielectric breakdown. The voltage at which a dielectric material ruptures is
called breakdown voltage, and the corresponding intensity of the external uniform
electric field is called the dielectric strength (also known as electric strength or
breakdown strength).
The breakdown voltage is measured in terms the unit of electric potential, e.g. kV. But
the dielectric strength is measured in terms of the unit of electric field intensity, i.e.
kV per unit distance, e.g. kV/mm. The dielectric strength of air is 3kVp/mm under
STP.
It may be noted here that the breakdown voltage varies depending upon the size of the
specimen, but the dielectric strength is an intrinsic property of the dielectric material
and hence does not vary with the size of the specimen.

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