Cited by 192Superconducting Materials and ApplicationsMagnetic confinement fusion researchFusion materials and technologies

The SPARC toroidal field model coil program

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Hartwig, Zachary S., Vieira, Rui F., Dunn, Darby, Golfinopoulos, Theodore, LaBombard, Brian, Lammi, Christopher J., Michael, Philip C., Agabian, Susan +90 more·2024·IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity

Abstract

The SPARC Toroidal Field Model Coil (TFMC) Program was a three-year effort between 2018 and 2021 that developed novel Rare Earth Barium Copper Oxide (REBCO) superconductor technologies and then successfully utilized these technologies to design, build, and test a first-in-class, high-field (∼20 T), representative-scale (∼3 m) superconducting toroidal field (TF) coil. The program was executed jointly by the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center (PSFC) and Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS) as a technology enabler of the superconducting high-field pathway to fusion energy, and, in particular, as a risk retirement program for the no insulation (NI) TF magnet in the SPARC net-energy fusion tokamak. The TFMC achieved its programmatic goal of experimentally demonstrating a large-scale high-field REBCO magnet, achieving 20.1 T peak field-on-conductor with 40.5 kA of terminal current, 815 kN/m of Lorentz loading on the REBCO stacks, and almost 1 GPa of mechanical stress accommodated by the structural case. Fifteen internal demountable pancake-to-pancake joints operated in the 0.5 to 2.0 nΩ range at 20 K and in magnetic fields up to 12 T. The DC and AC electromagnetic performance of the magnet predicted by new advances in high-fidelity computational models was confirmed in two test campaigns while the parallel, single-pass, pressure-vessel style coolant scheme capable of large heat removal was validated. In the test facility, a feeder system composed of REBCO current leads and cables was experimentally qualified up to 50 kA, and a liquid-free cryocooler-based helium cryogenic system provided 600 W of cooling power at 20 K with mass flow rates up to 70 g/s at a maximum design pressure of 2 MPa for the test campaigns. Finally, the feasibility of using passive, self-protection against a quench in a fusion-scale NI TF coil was experimentally assessed. While the TFMC was intentionally not optimized for quench resiliency – and suffered localized thermal damage in response to an intentional open-circuit quench at 31.5 kA terminal current – the extensive data and validated models that it produced represent a critical step towards this important objective.

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Crossref · 10.1109/tasc.2023.3332613

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Authors
Hartwig, Z. S., Vieira, R. F., Dunn, D., Golfinopoulos, T., LaBombard, B., Lammi, C. J., Michael, P. C., Agabian, S., Arsenault, D., Barnett, R., Barry, M., Bartoszek, L., Beck, W. K., Bellofatto, D., Brunner, D., Burke, W., Burrows, J., Byford, W., Cauley, C., Chamberlain, S., Chavarria, D., Cheng, J., Chicarello, J., Diep, V., Dombrowski, E., Doody, J., Doos, R., Eberlin, B., Estrada, J., Fry, V., Fulton, M., Garberg, S., Granetz, R., Greenberg, A., Greenwald, M., Heller, S., Hubbard, A. E., Ihloff, E., Irby, J. H., Iverson, M., Jardin, P., Korsun, D., Kuznetsov, S., Lane-Walsh, S., Landry, R., Lations, R., Leccacorvi, R., Levine, M., Mackay, G., Metcalfe, K., Moazeni, K., Mota, J., Mouratidis, T., Mumgaard, R., Muncks, J., Murray, R. A., Nash, D., Nottingham, B., O'Shea, C., Pfeiffer, A. T., Pierson, S. Z., Purdy, C., Radovinsky, A., Ravikumar, D. K., Reyes, V., Riva, N., Rosati, R., Rowell, M., Salazar, E. E., Santoro, F., Sattarov, A., Saunders, W., Schweiger, P., Schweiger, S., Shepard, M., Shiraiwa, S., Silveira, M., Snowman, F., Sorbom, B. N., Stahle, P., Stevens, K., Stillerman, J., Tammana, D., Toland, T. L., Tracey, D., Turcotte, R., Uppalapati, K., Vernacchia, M., Vidal, C., Voirin, E., Warner, A., Watterson, A., Whyte, D. G., Wilcox, S., Wolf, M., Wood, B., Zhou, L., & Zhukovsky, A.
Affiliations
  • Massachusetts Institute of Technology (US)
  • Commonwealth Fusion Systems (United States) (US)
  • Bartoszek Engineering, Aurora, IL, USA
  • Commonwealth Fusion Systems, Devens, MA, USA
  • MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center, Cambridge, MA, USA
  • eViorin Engineering Consulting, Batavia, IL, USA
  • Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (DE)
Venue
IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity
Published
2024-03
Volume
34
Issue
2
Pages
1-16
ISSN
  • 1051-8223 (ISSN-L)
  • 1558-2515
  • 2378-7074
OpenAlex
W4388624351
Cited by
192
References
69
Citations by year
2026: 49 · 2025: 84 · 2024: 53 · 2023: 6
FWCI
15.17
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Locations
IEEE Transactions on Applied Superconductivity (publishedVersion, cc-by)
Funders
  • MIT Plasma Science and Fusion Center
  • Commonwealth Fusion Systems
  • CFS
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Engineering › Biomedical Engineering › Superconducting Materials and Applications
  • Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Nuclear and High Energy Physics › Magnetic confinement fusion research
  • Physical Sciences › Materials Science › Materials Chemistry › Fusion materials and technologies
Keywords
SPARC tokamak, toroidal field coils, REBCO superconductors, high-field superconducting magnets, quench protection, current leads, fusion energy

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