Heat Transfer Simulation to Liquid Nitrogen from HTS Tapes at the Overload Currents

Abstract Knowledge of HTS materials behavior at overload currents is important to design fault current limiters or fault protection systems of electro-technical devices. There are sharp voltage peaks and voltage oscillations during rectangular current pulses (DC current) on HTS tapes cooled by liquid nitrogen. It is common knowledge that a homogeneous liquid can withstand certain amount of overheating before switching to the boiling phase. In the liquid nitrogen during the increase of the heat flux there is superheating (temperature overshoot) and boiling hysteresis takes place. We explain voltage peaks and voltage oscillations by the hysteresis phenomenon in boiling nitrogen during the increase and decrease of the heat flux in the nitrogen which is a result of current redistribution in the HTS tapes. Based on the measurements of voltage and temperature of the HTS tapes during current overload and numerical analysis of the process we estimated the heat-transfer characteristics from the HTS tapes to liquid nitrogen. We also obtained the information about limiting superheating of the liquid nitrogen. The influence of covers of the HTS tapes on superheating of the nitrogen is also discussed.