Design and testing of a 13. 75-MW converter for a superconducting magnetic-energy-storage system

A 30 MJ superconducting magnetic energy storage system will be installed in 1982 in Tacoma, WA, to act as a transmission line stabilizer. Two 6 MVA transformers and a 5.5 kA, + 2.5 kV converter will connect the superconducting coil to the 13.8 kV bus and regulate the power flow between the coil and the three phase system. The design philosophy for the converter including its control and protection system is given in the paper. The converter has been tested with 10% overvoltage at no load, with 10% overcurrent at zero output voltage and with a watercooled resistive load of about 1 MW. These test results show that the converter will meet the expected full load operating conditions.