Progress in American Superconductor's HTS wire and optimization for fault current limiting systems

Highlights: • AMSC HTS wire critical current needed for rotating machinery is doubled by 16 MeV Au irradiation. • Nonuniformity of HTS wires in power devices causes hot spot formation during power system faults. • Lower normal-state resistivity and critical current lower HTS wire hot spot heating during faults. • HTS wire hot spot heating in HTS cables during faults must stay below lN₂ bubble nucleation point. • HTS wire can be designed to meet hot spot heating limits in fault current limiting cables. - Abstract: American Superconductor has developed composite coated conductor tape-shaped wires using high temperature superconductor (HTS) on a flexible substrate with laminated metal stabilizer. Such wires enable many applications, each requiring specific optimization. For example, coils for HTS rotating machinery require increased current density J at 25–50 K. A collaboration with Argonne, Brookhaven and Los Alamos National Laboratories and several universities has increased J using an optimized combination of precipitates and ion irradiation defects in the HTS. Major commercial opportunities also exist to enhance electric power grid resiliency by linking substations with distribution-voltage HTS power cables [10]. Such links provide alternative power sources if one substation's transmission-voltage power is compromised. But they must also limit fault currents which would otherwise be increased by such distribution-level links. This can be done in an HTS cable, exploiting the superconductor-to-resistive transition when current exceeds the wires' critical J. A key insight is that such transitions are usually nonuniform; so the wire must be designed to prevent localized hot spots from damaging the wire or even generating gas bubbles in the cable causing dielectric breakdown. Analysis shows that local heating can be minimized by increasing the composite tape's total thickness, decreasing its total resistance in the normal state and decreasing its critical J. This conflicts with other desirable wire characteristics. Optimization of these conflicting requirements is discussed.