Assessment of Tropical Equatorial Climates on OPGW Cables Performance

摘要

The adequate performance of outside telecommunications network products depends on their capacity of best answering to performance requisites demanded by the operational environments. Countries located in tropical regions, such as Brazil, have more and more required customized products. However, its particular environmental features demand quick answers in terms of technology, in order to provide reliability and optimized durability for such products according to the best cost/benefit ratio. Considering climatic factors such as temperature, relative humidity and atmospheric pollutants, two localities from the five described by Koeppen were selected: Manaus e Fortaleza. The cables were exposed for 18 months in field. Every three months the samples were removed and submitted to laboratory tests for electric resistivity, tensile test, and visual examination. For the environmental characterization, there was a follow-up of parameters of temperature, humidity and pollutants derived from chlorine and sulfur.