Characterization of Commercial MgB 2 Conductors for Magnet Application in SMES

Nowadays, long lengths of MgB
₂
conductors on the kilometer scale fabricated by the powder-in-tube process are commercially available. Due to its relatively low cost, high critical current density J
_c
, low anisotropy, and a critical temperature of about 40 K, MgB
₂
may be attractive for several applications. Examples of these are as MgB
₂
coils for superconductor transformers, as induction heaters, or as MRI magnets. MgB
₂
conductors also promise to be a usable option for superconducting coils in wind generators or as a superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) for the recently proposed LIQHYSMES approach. LIQHYSMES as a new hybrid energy concept combines the use of LIQuid HYdrogen as the primary high-density energy carrier with SMES for fast and efficient buffering. In this paper, we present the physical properties of MgB
₂
wires tested in several experimental configurations of a projected MgB
₂
-based solenoid of a small LIQHYSMES test setup.