Press Release Back Number(2005)

Chubu Electric Power establishes ultra-high-speed yttrium-based superconductive wire synthesis technology
- Dramatically accelerates development of next-generation superconductive devices -

October 19, 2005
Chubu Electric Power Co., Inc.

Chubu Electric Power has developed an ultra-high-speed synthesis technology for yttrium-based superconductive wires, a technology whose practical applications are highly anticipated. Using wires based on this technology, Chubu Electric Power has also developed compact magnets that generate powerful magnetic fields.


This breakthrough offers the potential for various advanced magnetic technologies, including high-performance superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) systems and large-capacity and low-loss superconductive cables.


This breakthrough was achieved as part of R&D efforts under the Fundamental Superconducting Application Technologies project, which is contracted to the International Superconductivity Technology Center (ISTEC) by the New Industry and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).


Involving investigations of physical behavior and applications when electrical resistance approaches zero, superconductivity technology can dramatically reduce electrical power losses at the distribution stage. For this reason, a wide range of environmentally-friendly applications of superconductivity are anticipated in the field of electrical power. Chubu Electric Power has proceeded to develop yttrium-based wires because the material offers higher current density and lower characteristic loss in magnetic fields than other superconducting materials.


In the past, Chubu Electric Power achieved wire synthesis speeds of 10 m/h for rapid production of wire strands measuring 100 meters in length, overcoming the most significant barrier to practical use of wire materials: producing long wire strands. This achievement is based on a multistage synthesizing technique *1 that uses multiple crystallization and synthesis processes. (This breakthrough was announced in June 2002.)


*1 A technique used to produce film at high speeds by multiplying the reactive domains of superconducting materials and accelerating the speed of base materials passing through these domains


By refining this multistage synthesizing technique, Chubu Electric Power achieved wire synthesis speeds greatly exceeding current rates of synthesis, significantly accelerating the rate at which long wire strands can be manufactured and achieving major progress toward practical implementation of this technology.


Summarized below are the key points of this breakthrough technology:

  1. 1. Development of ultra-high-speed synthesis technology:
    - By refining its existing multistage synthesizing technique, Chubu Electric Power achieved wire synthesis speeds of 50m/h (with current densities of approximately 2 million A/cm2), with promise for future practical applications
  2. 2. Development of a small magnetic-field magnet*2
    - The company also developed a small prototype magnet (64 millimeters in diameter and 77 millimeters in height) using yttrium wire materials. This magnet boasts a magnetic field of 0.65 Tesla*3 - among the world's most powerful magnetic fields for yttrium wire magnets.

*2 Under the Superconducting Power Network Control Technology Development project sponsored by the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy of Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry as a national project for SMES development, a small prototype magnet has been developed using wires produced by ultra-high-speed synthesis technology.

*3 The Tesla is a unit used to express magnetic flux density.


This project is expected to continue making progress toward its goal of high performance coupled with low-cost technologies.