Earticle

This paper reviews recent progress in research and development (R&D) of reactive co-evaporation for high performance REBCO coated conductors in Korea. Two types of reactive co-evaporation methods were developed for the deposition of SmBCO and GdBCO superconducting layers respectively on the IBAD (Ion Beam Assisted Deposition)-MgO template in the Korean coated conductor project. Batch type reactive co-evaporation equipment and its processing were developed for SmBCO coated conductors at Korea Electrotechnology Research Institute (KERI) in conjunction with the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), and a very high critical current exceeding 1,000 A/cm at 77 K in the self field was achieved through the optimization of deposition parameters. Reel-to-reel type reactive co-evaporation processing with a high conversion rate was also developed, while long length GdBCO coated conductors have been routinely produced by SuNAM Co. The minimum critical current of 422 A/cm-w at 77 K in self field was confirmed for 1 km-long GdBCO tape.

Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR) has a helium refrigeration system (HRS) with the cooling capacity of 9 kW at 4.5 K. Main cold components are composed of 300 tons of superconducting (SC) magnets, main cryostat thermal shields, and SC current feeder system. The HRS comprises six gas storage tanks, a liquid nitrogen tank, the room temperature compression sector, the cold box (C/B), the 1st stage helium distribution box (DB#1), the PLC base local control system interconnected to central control tower and so on. Between HRS and cold components, there’s another distribution box (DB#2) nearby the KSTAR device. The entire KSTAR device was constructed in 2007 and has been operated since 2008. This paper will present the maintenance result of the KSTAR HRS during the campaign and discuss the operation record and maintenance history of the KSTAR HRS.

We have clearly investigated with respect to the survival of the insulator at cryogenic temperature under the electrical stress. The breakdown and voltage-time characteristics of turn-to-turn models for point contact geometry and surface contact geometry using copper multi wrapped with polyimide film for an HTS transformer were investigated under AC and impulse voltage at 77 K. Polyimide film (Kapton) 0.025 mm thick is used for multi wrapping of the electrode. As expected, the breakdown voltages for the surface contact geometry are lower than that of the point contact geometry, because the contact area of the surface contact geometry is lager than that of the point contact geometry. The time to breakdown t50 decreases as the applied voltage is increased, and the lifetime indices increase slightly as the number of layers is increased. The electric field amplitude at the position where breakdown occurs is about 80 % of the maximum electric field value. The relationship between survival probability and the electrical stress at cryogenic temperature was evident.

We investigated the flux pinning properties of both 10 mol% Zr-and Sn-doped YBa2Cu3O7-δ (YBCO) films with the same thickness of ~350 nm for a comparative purpose. The films were prepared on the SrTiO3 (STO) single crystal substrate by the metal-organic deposition (MOD) process. Compared with Sn-doped YBCO film, Zr-doped one exhibited a significant enhancement in the critical current density (Jc) and pinning force density (Fp). The anisotropic Jc,min/Jc,max ratio in the field-angle dependence of Jc at 77 K for 1 T was also improved from 0.23 for Sn-doped YBCO to 0.39 for Zr-doped YBCO. Thus, the highest magnetic Jc values of 9.0 and 2.9 MA/cm2 with the maximum Fp (Fp,max) values of 19 and 5 GN/m3 at 65 and 77 K for H // c, respectively, could be achieved from Zr-doped YBCO film. The stronger pinning effect in Zr-doped YBCO film is attributable to smaller BaZrO3 (BZO) nanoparticles (the average size ≈ 28.4 nm) than YBa2SnO5.5 (YBSO) nanoparticles (the average size ≈ 45.0 nm) incorporated in Sn-doped YBCO film since smaller nanoparticles can generate more defects acting as effective flux pinning sites due to larger incoherent interfacial area for the same doping concentration.

In power grid, in order to level out the generation with demand, up-gradation of the system is occasionally required. This will lead to more fault current levels. However, upgrading all the protection instruments of the system is both costly and extravagant. This issue could be dominated by using Smart Fault Current Controller (SFCC). While the impact of Fault current Limiters (FCL) in various locations has been studied in different situations for years, the performance of SFCC has not been investigated extensively. In this research, SFCC which has adopted the characteristics of a full bridge thyristor rectifier with a superconducting coil is applied to three main locations such as load feeder, Bus-tie position and main feeder location and its behavior is investigated through simulation in presence and absence of small Distributed Generation unit (DG). The results show a huge difference in limiting the fault current when using SFCC.

Smart fault current controller (SFCC) proposed in our previous work consists of a power converter, a high temperature superconducting (HTS) DC reactor, thyristors, and a control unit [1]. SFCC can limit and control the current by adjusting firing angles of thyristors when a fault occurs. SFCC has complex structure because the HTS DC reactor generates the loss under AC. To use the DC reactor under AC, rectifier that consists of four thyristors is needed and it increases internal resistance of SFCC. For this reason, authors propose a hybrid type superconducting fault current limiter (SFCL). The hybrid type SFCL proposed in this paper consists of a non-inductive superconducting coil and two thyristors. To verify the feasibility of the proposed hybrid type SFCL, simulations about the interaction of the superconducting coil and thyristors are conducted when fault current flows in the superconducting coil. Authors expect that the hybrid type SFCL can control the magnitude of the fault current by adjusting the firing angles of thyristors after the superconducting coil limits the fault current at first peak.

The studies of superconducting fault current limiter (SFCL) for reduction of the fault current are actively underway in the worldwide. In this paper, we analyzed the characteristics of a new type SFCL using the conventional transformer and superconducting elements combined mutually. The secondary and third windings of this SFCL were connected the load and the superconducting element, respectively. The electric power was provided to load connected to secondary windings of the transformer in normal state of power system. On the other hand, when the fault occurred in power system, the fault current was limited by closing the line of third winding of the transformer. At this time, the ripple phenomenon of the fault was minimized by opening the fault line in secondary winding of a transformer in power system. The sensing of the fault state was performed by the CT(current transformer) and then turn-on and turn-off switching behavior of the SFCL was performed by the SCR(silicon-controlled rectifier). As a result, the proposed SFCL limited the fault current within a half-cycle efficiently. We confirmed that the fault current limitation rate was changed according to the winding ratio of a transformer.

According to the increase of electric consumption nowadays, power system becomes complicated. Due to this, the size of single line-to-ground fault from power system also increases to have many problems. In order to resolve these problems effectively, an Superconducting Fault Current Limiter(SFCL) was proposed and continuous study has been done. In this paper, an SFCL was combined to the neutral line of a transformer. An superconductivity has the characteristics of zero resistance below critical temperature. because of this, SFCL has nearly zero resistance. so we connecting SFCL to neutral line will not only have any loss in the normal operation but also have the less burden of electric power because of only limiting the initial fault current. We analyzed the characteristics of current, voltage according to the changes of turn ratio of 3 phase system in case of combinations of an SFCL to the neutral line. It was confirmed that the limiting rate of initial fault current by the increase of turn ratio was reduced.

To reduce the magnetization loss of a coated conductor, the striation and the transposition have to be accomplished for magnetic decoupling. The loss reduction effect in incomplete as well as complete striated YBCO CCs was reported in previous research. At the case of the incomplete striated sample, the end region of the sample is non-striated. So, it is not jointed with each other. In power applications, the joint is needed because current leads must be connected with HTS coils. In this research, the influence of end-joint methods with copper and superconducting joint on magnetization loss in striated YBCO CC and spiral winding samples are presented and compared with non-striated measured result.

We had proposed a winding method so called “Wind-and-Flip”, which enables a persistent current operation of an HTS pancake coil without any electrical joint. In order to improve the magnetic field drift characteristics, a prototype HTS coil with the technique was fabricated, and tested under various temperatures. Because the coil doesn’t have any electric terminals for current leads, an HTS background magnet was used to induce the persistent current in the coil by field cooling process. A conduction cooling system with a GM cryocooler was prepared to keep the operating temperatures of the prototype coil much below the 77 K. We investigated the magnetic field drift characteristics under the various operating temperatures by measuring the center magnetic field with a cryogenic Hall sensor. The persistent current mode operation at 20 ~ 50K showed a strong possibility of the winding technique for the application such as MRI or NMR.

This paper compares the features of second generation (2G) High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) field coil with those of magnesium diboride (MgB2) field coil for a 10 MW class superconducting generator. Both coils can function effectively in their respective magnetic flux density range: 10-12 T for 2G HTS field coil, 2 T for MgB2 superconducting field coil. Even though some leading researchers have been developing 10 MW class superconducting generator with 2G HTS field coil, other research groups have begun to focus on MgB2 wire, which is more economical and suitable for mass production. However 2G HTS wire is still appealing in functions such as in-field property and critical temperature, it shows higher in-field property and critical temperature than MgB2 wire.

KSTAR in-vessel cryo-pump has been installed in the vacuum vessel top and bottom side with up-down symmetry for the better plasma density control in the D-shape H-mode. The cryogenic helium lines of the in-vessel cryo-pump are located at the vertical positions from the vacuum vessel torus center 2,000 mm. The inductive electrical potential has been optimized to reduce risk of electrical breakdown during plasma disruption. In-vessel cryo-pump consists of three parts of coaxial circular shape components; cryo-panel, thermal shield and particle shield. The cryo-panel is cooled down to below 4.5 K. The cryo-panel and thermal shields were made by Inconel 625 tube for higher mechanical strength. The thermal shields and their cooling tubes were annealed in air environment to improve the thermal radiation emissivity on the surface. Surface of cryo-panel was electro-polished to minimize the thermal radiation heat load. The in-vessel cryo-pump was pre-assembled on a test bed in 180 degree segment base. The leak test was carried out after the thermal shock between room temperature to LN2 one before installing them into vacuum vessel. Two segments were welded together in the vacuum vessel and final leak test was performed after the thermal shock. Commissioning of the in-vessel cryo-pump was carried out using a temporary liquid helium supply system.