Superconductors Power Up

This article reviews the copper cables in Detroit Edison’s Frisbie Station to be retrofit in mid-2000 with high-temperature superconductor (HTS) cables to support a major urban redevelopment project in downtown Detroit. American Superconductor’s partner, Pirelli, is participating in this project. The three HTS cables, weighing 250 pounds, will carry 100 megawatts of power, a job that nine copper cables, with a total weight of 18,000 pounds, are doing. In Germany, Siemens AG has invested hundreds of millions of dollars into researching HTS, because the capability can bring improvements across the German conglomerate’s businesses, from power to transportation to electronic devices. The principal commercial US players are American Superconductor, 3M, and Intermagnetics General. Each has organized efforts to develop commercial processes for manufacturing HTS tape based on coated conductors.