RADIABEAM TECHNOLOGIES, LLC — Department of Energy SBIR Phase I: Experimental measurement of Normal Zone Propagation (NZP) velocity in HTS 2G wires yields

Description

Experimental measurement of Normal Zone Propagation (NZP) velocity in HTS 2G wires yields values below 1 mm/s. Such low propagation velocity results in concentrated energy dissipation and irreversible damage of the magnet during an unprotected quench. This project seeks to develop a novel method for quench protection of high-temperature superconducting (HTS) magnets based on coupling the magnet with a high-power resonant coil. The quench protection is realized by applying an electromagnetic pulse through the resonant coil and disrupting the superconducting state in the conductor. This creates a large (10s of meters) normal zone in less than 10 ms, thus ensuring even distribution of the energy dissipation. The proposed protection system does not involve generation of high voltage on the coil leads and does not contribute to cryogenic losses. The system is easily scaled to a magnet of arbitrary size. Commercial Applications and Other Benefits: Conventional HTS market segments such as energy, medical and R & amp;D could immediately benefit from reductions in mean time between failures (MTBF) and increased overall availability of devices within these market segment. Device failure within certain systems such as the power grid or high energy physics facilities not only carry typical labor and material costs for replacement, but significant opportunity cost. Even with the most conservation calculations, this opportunity cost for high energy physics experiments is estimated to be ~$10k / hour.