Low Friction Cryostat for HTS Power Cable of Dutch Project

Particulars of 6km long HTS AC power cable for Amsterdam project are: a cable has to fit in an annulus of 160mm, with only two cooling stations at the cable ends [1]. Application of existing solutions for HTS cables would result in excessively high coolant pressure drop in the cable, possibly affecting public acceptance of the project.

In order to solve this problem, a model cryostat was developed consisting of alternating rigid and flexible sections and hydraulic tests were conducted using sub-cooled liquid nitrogen. In the 47 m-long cryostat, containing a full-size HTS cable model, measured pressure drop amounts 11 mbar at the mass flow rate of 0.3kg/s and temperature 65K.

For a 6 km-long HTS cable this gives a pressure drop below 2bar, which is acceptable. In order to achieve this result, the cryostat was manufactured from alternating straight rigid sections and corrugated flexible sections. A flexible dummy HTS cable was inserted into this cryostat and sub-cooled liquid nitrogen was circulated in the annulus between the dummy cable surface and the inner cryostat surface.

In the paper details are presented of the cryostat, of the measurement setup, of the experiment and of the results.