Experimental studies of current sharing in parallel driven Graetz bridge units for diurnal superconductive magnetic energy storage

Superconductive Magnetic Energy Storage (SMES) coils for diurnal load leveling and system peaking are envisioned to operate at hundreds of thousands of amperes and a few kilovolts. The interface between the SMES coil and the electric utility is envisioned to be Graetz bridges using SCR switches. Many parallel SCR switches or bridge units will have to operate in parallel because of the high operating current of the coil. Current balancing on parallel Graetz bridges driving a single 8-hy superconducting coil has been achieved on a laboratory model using delay-angle control with an LSI 11/2 microprocessor and external digital control hardware.