The main aim of the EU H2020 project EcoSwing was to demonstrate a technical readiness level of 6–7 for high-temperature superconducting (HTS) technology operating in a wind generator. To reach this goal, a full-scale synchronous HTS generator was successfully designed, built and field-tested in a 3.6 MW turbine. The generator has a rotor with 40 superconducting coils of 1.4 m long. The required >20 km of coated conductor was produced within the project’s time schedule. All coils were tested prior to assembly, with >90% of them behaving as expected. The technical readiness level of HTS coils was thus increased to level 7. Simultaneously, the maturing of cryogenic cooling technology over the last decade was illustrated by the several Gifford-McMahon cold-heads that were installed on-board the rotor and connected with the stationary compressors through a rotating coupling. The cryogenic system outperformed design expectations, enabling stable coil temperatures far below the design temperature of 30 K after only 14 d of cool-down. After ground-based testing at the IWES facility in Bremerhaven, Germany, the generator was installed on an existing turbine in Thyborøn, Denmark. Here, the generator reached the target power range and produced power for over 650 h of grid operation.
High temperature superconducting (HTS) generators could enable a lightweight and cost-effective direct drive (DD) wind turbines with large power ratings. The EU-funded EcoSwing project successfully demonstrated the world's first full-scale MWclass HTS generator on a commercial DD wind turbine. This paper focuses on the commissioning of the EcoSwing HTS generator on the wind turbine. The commissioning campaigns, including the rotor cool-down, excitation of the HTS field winding, and the power production of the generator, are presented in the paper. In the testing period, the generator was grid-connected for more than 650 hours and accumulatively produced more than 600 MWh to the grid. The target output power of the 3 MW class was reached. Throughout the real-life testing on the wind turbine, the generator performed well from the electromagnetic, thermal, and mechanical perspectives. Moreover, the generator even sustained three sudden short circuits in the converter system. The work reported has shown that HTS generators are technologically feasible for wind turbine applications, and the technology readiness level of HTS Manuscript
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