SUPRAPOWER

"SUPerconducting, Reliable, lightweight, And more POWERful offshore wind turbine"

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 Obiettivo del progetto (Objective)

'SUPRAPOWER is a research project focused on a major innovation in offshore wind turbine technology by developing a new compact superconductor-based generator.

The project aims to provide an important breakthrough in offshore wind industrial solutions by designing an innovative, lightweight, robust and reliable 10 MW class offshore wind turbine based on a superconducting (SC) generator, taking into account all the essential aspects of electric conversion, integration and manufacturability.

Today’s geared as well as direct-drive permanent magnet generators are difficult to scale up further. Their huge size and weight drives up the cost of both fixed and floating foundations as well as O&M cost. New solutions to provide better power scalability, weight reduction and reliability are needed. Superconductivity may be the only technology able to combine such features and allow scaling to 10 MW and beyond by radical reduction of the head mass.

SUPRAPOWER will pursue the following general objectives:

• To reduce turbine head mass, size and cost of offshore wind turbines by means of a compact superconducting generator.

• To reduce O&M and transportation costs and increase life cycle using an innovative direct drive system.

• To increase the reliability and efficiency of high power wind turbines by means of drive-train specific integration in the nacelle.

Starting from an already patent-applied concept, the coordinator has assembled a top-class European consortium from 7 countries. Industrial partners are a wind turbine manufacturer, an energy company, an SME superconducting wire developer, a cryogenic systems supplier, and an offshore engineering company. In addition to the coordinator, research partners are a large laboratory with deep experience in superconductivity, a university and a national institute.

The main outcome of the project will be a proof of concept for a key European technology to scale wind turbines up to power levels of 10MW and beyond'

Introduzione (Teaser)

EU-funded international consortium constituted by research institutions and industry is developing an innovative, lightweight, robust and reliable 10 MW offshore wind turbine based on an MgB2 superconducting generator.

Descrizione progetto (Article)

More powerful offshore wind turbines are needed to contribute to the reduction of the cost of the energy required by the sector. But current turbines need new solutions to provide better power scalability, weight reduction and reliability. Their enormous size and weight drives up the cost of the tower, of both fixed and floating foundations, as well as operation and maintenance costs.

In the EU-funded project 'Superconducting, reliable, lightweight, and more powerful offshore wind turbine' (http://www.suprapower-fp7.eu/ (SUPRAPOWER)), the consortium is developing a superconductor-based generator able to work in next-generation of large offshore wind turbines. Project consortium considers that superconducting generators may be the only option to provide a radical reduction of the turbine head mass. SUPRAPOWER superconducting generator concept is a 10 MW Direct Drive salient poles synchronous machine that relies on the use of MgB2 (magnesium diboride) DC field coils in the rotor and a cryogen free cooling system.

Field coils consist on a stack of several MgB2 double pancake coils serial connected working at cryogenic temperature, while iron poles are kept at room temperature. In the first half of the project the MgB2 coil design has been completed and first real scale double pancake has been manufactured and tested with a cryogen free cooling system.

The cryogen-free cooling system in rotating configuration is a key innovation that basically consists of two parts: one modular cryostat per coil and a thermal collector that links all the modules. The heat is extracted by two stage G-M cryocoolers that rotate jointly with the rotor. Heat is extracted by conduction through two high conductivity thermal circuits in the thermal collector. This system requires lower maintenance and is more reliable than other cryogenic cooling options.

Compared to permanent magnet generators, SUPRAPOWER one is expected to be more lightweight by 30 %, while avoiding the use of rare earths materials that lately showed great fluctuations in price (600 % in 2011). The 10 MW generator will be experimentally validated by dint of a rotary scale machine. Main innovative superconducting and cryogenic components are equal in both 10 MW and scale machines.

Offshore wind power capacity is expected to reach a total of 100 GW worldwide by 2020. SUPRAPOWER's overall aim is to provide cost effective more powerful wind turbines to meet the EU 2020 target of cutting emissions by 20 %.