3. Characteristics of the coils

108

Many superconductor applications require cables with a high current capacity. This is not feasible with single-piece coated conductors because their ac losses are too large. Therefore, it is necessary to develop superconducting cables with a high current capacity and low ac losses. One promising solution is given by ROEBEL cables. We assembled three ROEBEL cables from commercial YBCO coated conductors. The cables have the same width but a different number of strands, which results in different aspect ratios and current capacities. We experimentally studied their ac losses under a transport current or a perpendicular magnetic field. In addition, we performed numerical calculations, which agree with the experiments, especially for the transport case. We found that in the cables there is good current sharing between the strands. We also found that stacking the strands reduces the magnetization losses. For a given critical current, thicker cables have lower magnetization ac losses. In addition, a conducting matrix is not required for a good current sharing between strands.

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Transport and magnetization ac losses of ROEBEL assembled coated conductor cables: measurements and calculations

Terzieva¹,

Vojenčiak²,

Pardo³

et al. 2009

108

Status of high transport current ROEBEL assembled coated conductor cables

Goldacker¹,

Frank

Kudymow

et al. 2009

112

Assembling coated conductors (CC) into flat ROEBEL bars (RACC cable) was introduced in 2005 by the authors as a practicable method of reaching high transport currents in a low AC loss cable, which is a cable design suited for application in windings. The transport current of 1.02 kA in self-field at 77 K achieved so far, however, is still too low for several applications in electrical machinery such as larger transformers and generators/motors. A new cable concept for further increased currents was presented just recently. The goal of the new design was primarily to demonstrate the possibility of strongly increased transport currents without changing the important cable features for low AC losses. such as, for example, the transposition length of the strands. We present detailed investigations of the properties of this progressed cable design, which has threefold layered strands, an unchanged transposition pitch of 18.8 cm and finally the application of 45 coated conductors in the cable. A 1.1 m long sample (equivalent to six transposition lengths) was prepared from commercial Cu stabilized coated conductors purchased from Superpower. The measured new record DC transport current of the cable was 2628 A at 77 K in self-field (5 μV cm −1 criterion). The use of three slightly different current carrying batches of strand material (±10%) was a special feature of the cable, which allowed for interesting investigations of current redistribution effects in the cable, by monitoring a representative strand of each batch during the critical current measurement. Although current redistribution effects showed a complex situation, the behaviour of the cable was found to be absolutely stable under all operational conditions, even above the critical current. The high self-field degradation of the critical current reached the order of 60% at 77 K, and could be modelled satisfactory with calculations based on a proven Biot-Savart-law approach, adapted to the specific boundary conditions given in this new cable design.

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

Goldacker

Grilli

Pardo

et al. 2014

266

139

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.