Research Progress on De-icing Technology for High-speed Railway Catenary Systems

Catenary icing poses a significant challenge for high-speed railway operations under extreme environmental conditions. China’s high-speed railway network is extensively affected by icing, with considerable variations in icing types across different regions and complex, diverse icing morphologies on catenary systems. Catenary icing on high-speed railways not only disrupts pantograph-catenary current collection, but also readily induces icing-induced galloping, which may lead to power supply interruptions in severe cases. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop safe and efficient catenary de-icing technologies. Different types and characteristics of contact network ice-covering are introduced, the development status of contact network de-icing technology is reviewed and summarized, the advantages and challenges of the existing contact network de-icing technology are discussed and analyzed, and finally looking forward to the development trend of contact network de-icing technology for high-speed railroads and the future research focus is put forward.