A non-percolative rGO/XLPE composite with high electrothermal performance at high voltage and effective de/anti-icing for transmission-lines

To develop effective and convenient de/anti-icing methods for electric transmission-lines has remained to be a challenging task. Electrothermal material has emerged as a promising approach, but the investigation of electrothermal material with high breakdown voltage remains sluggish. Herein, a high electrothermal property and voltage resistant graphene/crosslinked polyethylene (XLPE) composite was prepared as a de/anti-icing material via an unconventional non-percolative structure. The isolated rGO sheets contribute to a record-high breakdown voltage of 1050–2600 V. The field emission at high voltage, resulted from the appropriate gap width between rGO sheets in non-percolated structure, enables these composites to generate electric currents and obvious temperature increases of 2–59.7 °C owing to Joule's effect. More importantly, the combined ideal heating performance and breakdown voltage enable the rGO-filled composites to achieve a high de-icing efficiency of 18 min and an effective anti-icing performance at −20 °C at 1100 V. These results pave the way to apply graphene/XLPE composites in transmission-lines de/anti-icing and other fields requiring joule heating at high voltage.