Thursday, 1A-05, 5:05-5:15

Conductor Requirements for Superconducting Fault Current Limiters (SFCL)

Charles S. Weber

SuperPower Inc, 450 Duane Ave, Schenectady, NY 12304
phone: (518) 346-1414, fax: (518) 346-6080, Email: cweber@superpower-inc.com

Electric utilities and large industrial customers have long sought solutions to mitigate the effects of large fault currents flowing through their power networks. Several conventional technologies, including current limiting reactors (CLR), pyrotechnical devices, and conventional circuit breakers have been employed to date but each of these has inherent limitations or drawbacks. Superconducting Fault Current Limiters (SFCLs) hold great potential to offer the benefits of conventional technology without many of the limitations. Development of SFCL's is being pursued by a growing number of organizations around the world and several different approaches have emerged to address utilities' needs. Each of these design concepts has unique requirements for the superconducting materials that enable them. This paper will briefly discuss the current status of SFCL projects and compare the HTS material requirements for each.

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