Michal Vojenciak

AC losses in coated conductors

Future use of coated conductors in electric power applications like transmission cables, transformers or fault current limiters is sensitive to the amount of dissipation in the AC regime. This paper analyses factors controlling AC loss of coated conductors in typical configurations: the self-field case when transport current generates the magnetic field, and the case of AC applied field where the orientation of magnetic field with respect to the superconducting layer plays a significant role. We illustrate that a high-quality CC tape with non-magnetic substrate follows rather well the models developed for a thin strip. However, to meet an excellent agreement between experiment and theoretical prediction a detailed knowledge of the superconductor properties is necessary and a numerical method must be involved. In the case of a superconducting layer deposited on a ferromagnetic substrate theoretical predictions give only basic directions and one must rely on numerical simulations entirely. We demonstrate that, with the help of a dedicated analysis of experimental data, very good AC loss prediction is also possible for superconductor?ferromagnetic composites. Novel designs of coated conductor architectures can be developed in this way.

Theoretical and experimental study of AC loss in high temperature superconductor single pancake coils

The electromagnetic properties of a pancake coil in an AC regime as a function of the number of turns is studied theoretically and experimentally. Specifically, the AC loss, the coil critical current and the voltage signal are discussed. The coils are made of Bi2Sr2Ca2Cu3O10/Ag (BiSCCO) tape, although the main qualitative results are also applicable to other kinds of superconducting tape, such as coated conductors. The AC loss and the voltage signal are electrically measured using different pick-up coils with the help of a transformer. One of them avoids dealing with the huge coil inductance. In addition, the critical current of the coils is experimentally determined by conventional DC measurements. Furthermore, the critical current, the AC loss and the voltage signal are simulated, showing a good agreement with the experiments. For all simulations, the field dependent critical current density inferred from DC measurements on a short tape sample is taken into account.

Roebel cables from REBCO coated conductors: a one-century-old concept for the superconductivity of the future

Energy applications employing high-temperature superconductors (HTS), such as motors/generators, transformers, transmission lines and fault current limiters, are usually operated in the alternate current (AC) regime. In order to be efficient, the HTS devices need to have a sufficiently low value of AC loss, in addition to the necessary current-carrying capacity. Most applications are operated with currents beyond the current capacity of single conductors and consequently require cabled conductor solutions with much higher current carrying capacity, from a few kA to up to 20-30 kA for large hydro-generators. A century ago, in 1914, Ludwig Roebel invented a low-loss cable design for copper cables, which was successively named after him. The main idea behind Roebel cables is to separate the current in different strands and to provide a full transposition of the strands along the cable direction. Nowadays, these cables are commonly used in the stator of large generators. Based on the same design concept of their conventional material counterparts, HTS Roebel cables from REBCO coated conductors were first manufactured at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) and have been successively developed in a number of varieties that provide all the required technical features such as fully transposed strands, high transport currents and low AC losses, yet retaining enough flexibility for a specific cable design. In the past few years a large number of scientific papers have been published on the concept, manufacturing and characterization of such cables. Times are therefore mature for a review of those results. The goal is to provide an overview and a succinct and easy-to-consult guide for users, developers, and manufacturers of this kind of HTS cables.

Low-magnetic-field dependence and anisotropy of the critical current density in coated conductors

Many applications of ReBCO-coated conductors operate at low magnetic fields in the superconductor (below 200 mT). In order to predict the critical current and AC loss in these applications, it is necessary to know the anisotropy and field dependence of the critical current density at low magnetic fields. In this paper, we obtain a formula for the critical current density in a coated conductor as a function of the local magnetic field and its orientation. Afterwards, we apply this formula to predict the critical current of a pancake coil that we constructed. We extract the critical current density of the tape from measurements of the in-field critical current at several orientations. Numerical simulations correct the effect of the self-field in the measurements and successfully predict the critical current in the pancake coil. We found that a simple elliptical model is not enough to describe the anisotropy of the critical current density. In conclusion, the analytical fit that we present is useful to predict the critical current of actual coils. Therefore, it may also be useful for other structures made of coated conductor, like power-transmission cables, Roebel cables and resistive fault current limiters.

Calibration free method for measurement of the AC magnetization loss

A calibration free measurement method for determination of the magnetization loss of superconducting samples exposed to the external AC magnetic field is presented. The idea is based on the measurement of the part of the power which is supplied by the AC source to the AC magnet generating the magnetic field, in which the sample is located. It uses a coil wound in parallel to the AC field magnet as the measurement coil. To achieve the necessary sensitivity, two identical systems are used, each consisting of an AC magnet and a measurement coil, one of them containing the sample and the other left empty. No measurement and/or calculation of the calibration constant is required. To confirm the suitability of this method, the loss of a Cu sample with known dissipation was measured. The applicability to the AC magnetization loss measurements of superconducting tapes is presented.

Self-Consistent Modeling of the

Numerical models for computing the effective critical current of devices made of high-temperature superconducting tapes require the knowledge of the Jc(B,θ) dependence, i.e., of the way the critical current density Jc depends on the magnetic flux density B and its orientation θ with respect to the tape. In this paper, we present a numerical model based on the critical state with angular field dependence of Jc to extract the Jc(B,θ) relation from experimental data. The model takes into account the self-field created by the tape, which gives an important contribution when the field applied in the experiments is low. The same model can be also used to compute the effective critical current of devices composed of electromagnetically interacting tapes. In this paper, we consider three examples: two differently current-rated Roebel cables composed of ten strands from REBCO coated conductors and a power cable prototype composed of 22 Bi-2223 tapes. The critical currents computed with the numerical model show good agreement with the measured ones. The simulations reveal also that several parameter sets in Jc(B,θ) give an equally good representation of the experimental characterization of the tapes and that the measured Ic values of cables are subjected to the influence of experimental conditions, such as Ic degradation due to the manufacturing and assembling process and nonuniformity of the tape properties. These two aspects make the determination of a very precise Jc(B,θ) expression probably unnecessary, as long as that expression is able to reproduce the main features of the observed angular dependence. The easiness of use of this model, which can be straightforwardly implemented in finite-element programs able to solve static electromagnetic problems, is very attractive both for researchers and device manufactures who want to characterize superconducting tapes and calculate the effective critical current of superconducting devices.

I_{c}

In this work we demonstrate that the use of striated tapes from coated conductors (CCs) significantly reduces the dissipation of a cable made of tapes wound helically on a round core when it is exposed to AC magnetic field. The coupling loss can vanish provided that the striations ensure electrical insulation between filaments and the cable length corresponds to an entire number of lay pitches. In our study we compare the magnetization loss in two cable models exposed to magnetic field perpendicular to their longitudinal axis. The overall geometry of the models was identical: each consisted of three tapes 4?mm wide that were placed with a pitch of 50?mm in a single layer on the 8?mm diameter round core. The cable length was designed to reach two complete tape pitches. In the first cable (the reference cable) tapes without striation were used; the second cable was prepared using similar tapes but striated to five filaments by laser processing. The AC loss was measured for cables without terminations as well as with low resistance terminations; this latter configuration simulates the conditions in a magnet winding. Our experiments have clearly shown the loss behavior expected in the regime of uncoupled filaments. In particular, at AC fields of 0.1?T amplitude the loss in the cable from striated tapes is five times lower than in the reference cable. Numerical models have explained the experimentally observed cable behavior in the whole range of AC fields.

of HTS Devices: How Accurate do Models Really Need to Be?

In this contribution, we develop a refined numerical model of pancake coils assembled from a coated conductor Roebel cable, which includes the angular dependence of the critical current density Jc on the magnetic field and the actual (three-dimensional) shape of the current lead used to inject the current. Previous works of ours indicate that this latter has an important influence on the measured value of the AC losses. For the simulation of the superconductor, we used two alternative models based on different descriptions of the superconductors properties and implemented in different mathematical schemes. For the simulation of the current lead we use a full three-dimensional finite-element model. The results of the simulation are compared with measurements and the main issues related to the modeling and the measurement of Roebel coils are discussed in detail.

Low AC loss cable produced from transposed striated CC tapes

Coated conductor applications such as fusion magnets, particle accelerator magnets and generator windings require high current-carrying capabilities. This requirement can be fulfilled by various cable concepts using commercial long length REBCO coated conductors with high current-carrying performance. In the past few years, our group has successfully developed the Roebel cable concept for coated conductors. The design advantages of such a cable are high current-carrying capability and low alternating current (AC) losses. Unfortunately, for large-scale applications, the possibilities of a simple scale-up of the Roebel geometry are limited and additional design ideas are needed. One way to reach the required high currents is the Rutherford cable concept. In this concept a conductor is wound with transposition on a flat metal former. In order to design the former, the bending properties of the Roebel assembled coated conductor cables (RACC) must be measured and characterized. This allows the identification of a destruction-free interval for the Roebel cable, in terms of bending angle and transposition length. In this work we designed and assembled a demonstrator of a coated conductor Rutherford cable (CCRC) with three RACC cables. We measured the critical current and the AC losses of the cable demonstrator. Our results show that, despite still needing efforts in terms of reproducibility of the assembly process and of AC loss reduction, this design is a promising and viable solution for high current-capacity cables made of coated conductors.

Self-Field Effects and AC Losses in Pancake Coils Assembled From Coated Conductor Roebel Cables

Nowadays, there is growing interest in using superconducting wires or tapes for the design and manufacture of devices such as cables, coils, rotating machinery, transformers and fault current limiters among others. Their high current capacity has made them the candidates of choice for manufacturing compact and light cables and coils that can be used in the large scale power applications described above. However, the performance of these cables and coils is limited by their critical current, which is determined by several factors, including the conductors material properties and the geometric layout of the device itself. In this work we present a self-consistent model for estimating the critical current of superconducting devices. This is of large importance when the operating conditions are such that the self-field produced by the current is comparable to the overall background field. The model is based on the asymptotic limit when time approaches infinity of Faradays equation written in terms of the magnetic vector potential. It uses a continuous E-J relationship and takes the angular dependence of the critical current density on the magnetic flux density into account. The proposed model is used to estimate the critical current of superconducting devices such as cables, coils, and coils made of transposed cables with very high accuracy. The high computing speed of this model makes it an ideal candidate for design optimization.