TAI-YANG RESEARCH COMPANY — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N231-040

Description

The U.S. Navy is actively developing new High Temperature Superconducting (HTS) technologies to support its all-electric ship program, which includes power distribution cables, DeGaussing cables (HTS-DG), unmanned Mine Sweeping, various motors/generators, and storage. The current HTS-DG being installed on the USS Ft. Lauderdale displays the first large scale installation of HTS on a Navy Platform. During installation, however, the predetermined, fixed lengths are either too long or too short due to a variety of reasons such as ship design modifications occurring after cable manufacturing. To accommodate these slight changes in length during shipboard installation, additional fixed lengths need to be either added or taken away to accommodate the actual/final length for the HTS-DG cable. The changes in length needed result in unwanted delays and expenses to the installation process. Similar to traditional Cu based DG cables, the Navy is seeking solutions for an HTS-DG cable installation process where the cable can be cut to length and ultimately connected to the power supply. Energy to Power Solutions (e2P) of Tallahassee, FL, in collaboration with the Florida State University Center for Advanced Power Systems (FSU-CAPS), proposes to design, fabricate, test, and install a rugged, prototype HTS-DG cable into a pre-installed, fixed length, empty conduit that possesses complex and contour bends similar to those expected on a Navy ship. The primary focus of the proposed Phase I effort will be to develop complete, fully functional systems, meeting specifications, which includes: a rugged HTS-DG cable bundle, the Warm-to-Cold (W/C) termination design, the key steps necessary for a successful HTS-DG cable installation process, and finally the electrical connection of the HTS-DG cable to the W/C termination. The proposed e2P-CAPS Phase I effort will fully simulate the entire HTS-DG cable shipboard installation process, rugged HTS cable bundle, and W/C termination hardware. The elegance of e2P’s proprietary W/C termination design and cable installation process being submitted is that it is HTS-DG cable configuration independent. All HTS cable bundle types, regardless of configuration, will work with e2P’s proprietary W/C termination design and cable installation technique. e2P has selected the Simple-Insulating-Stack (SIS) as the baseline HTS-DG cable but is prepared to demonstrate the installation technique on various HTS cable configurations, such as the CORC and CORT, to highlight the versatility and adaptability of the process. This approach allows for the standardization of the installation process, taking the focus off the type of HTS-DG cable. With this approach, the HTS cable bundle type is no longer a limiting factor for NSWC during any future installations, opening the opportunity for streamlining and increasing efficiency when implementing HTS power cable systems across any Navy Platform.