Thursday, January 21, 2010

Super cool power

No more power lines? / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com

Interesting article here on superconducting power cables, which sound to be more advanced that I would have guessed:

A tour of American Superconductor’s factory found the company creating flat metal tape out of “high-temperature superconducting” (HTS) oxide materials and costly silver, then slicing it into thin flat strips. The strips wrap around a pipe carrying liquid nitrogen, which cools the cable to minus 346 degrees Fahrenheit....

Cost, however, has long been a major issue. However, the price gap is closing, American Superconductor says. A 1,000-mile length of superconducting cable capable of carrying 5,000 megawatts would cost about $8 million to $13 million per mile, a recent company white paper says. That’s about on par with the 
$7 million to $10 million cost per mile for an equivalent conventional 765 kilovolt line.
I wonder what happens if the nitrogen supply leaks. The article says that being below ground, the cables are more terrorist proof, but I wouldn't be so sure.

1 comment:

Bruce Princeton said...

How terrorist proof they are, this can only be known when tested. As for nitrogent, I hope they do something like what PrincetonCryo has done and then all their worries would get solved.