Publication
A low-AC loss Rare-earth barium copper oxide (REBCO) cable, based on the VIPER cable technology has been developed by commonwealth fusion systems for use in high-field, compact tokamaks. The new cable is composed of partitioned and transposed copper ‘petals’ shaped to fit together in a circular pattern with each petal containing a REBCO tape stack and insulated from each other to reduce AC losses. A stainless-steel jacket adds mechanical robustness—also serving as a vessel for solder impregnation—while a tube runs through the middle for cooling purposes. Additionally, fiber optic sensors are placed under the tape stacks for quench detection (QD). To qualify this design, a series of experiments were conducted as part of the SPARC tokamak central solenoid (CS) model coil program—to retire the risks associated with full-scale, fast-ramping, high-flux high temperature superconductors CS and poloidal field coils for tokamak fusion power plants and net-energy demonstrators. These risk-study and risk-reduction experiments include (1) AC loss measurement and model validation in the range of ∼5 T s−1, (2) an IxB electromagnetic (EM) loading of over 850 kN m−1 at the cable level and up to 300 kN m−1 at the stack level, (3) a transverse compression resilience of over 350 MPa, (4) manufacturability at tokamak-relevant speeds and scales, (5) cable-to-cable joint performance, (6) fiber optic-based QD speed, accuracy, and feasibility, and (7) overall winding pack integration and magnet assembly. The result is a cable technology, now referred to as PIT VIPER, with AC losses that measure fifteen times lower (at ∼5 T s−1) than its predecessor technology; a 2% or lower degradation of critical current (Ic) at high IxB EM loads; no detectable Ic degradation up to 600 MPa of transverse compression on the cable unit cell; end-to-end magnet manufacturing, consistently producing Ic values within 7% of the model prediction; cable-to-cable joint resistances at 20 K on the order of ∼15 nΩ; and fast, functional QD capabilities that do not involve voltage taps.