• Progress in Superconductivity
• /
• v.13 no.1
• /
• pp.58-63
• /
• 2011

Recently, superconductor flywheel energy storage systems (SFESs) have been developed for application to a regenerative power of train, a power quality improvement, the storage of distributed power sources such as solar and wind power, and a load leveling. As the high temperature superconductor (HTS) bearings offer dynamic stability without the use of active control, accurate analysis of the HTS bearing is very important for application to SFESs. Mechanical property of a HTS bearing is the main index for evaluating the capacity of an HTS bearing and is determined by the interaction between the HTS bulks and the permanent magnet (PM) rotor. HTS bearing rotor consists of PM and iron collector and the proper dimension design of them is very important to determine a supporting characteristics. In this study, we have optimized a rotor magnet array, which depends on the limited bulk size and performed various dimension layouts for thickness of the pole pitch and iron collector. HTS bearing rotor was installed into a single axis universal test machine for a stiffness test. A hydraulic pump was used to control the amplitude and frequency of the rotor vibration. As a result, the stiffness result showed a large difference more than 30 % according to the thickness of permanent magnet and iron collector. This is closely related to the bulk stiffness controlled by flux pining area, which is limited by the total bulk dimension. Finally, the optimized HTS bearing rotor was installed into a flywheel system for a dynamic stability test. We discussed the dynamic properties of the superconductor bearing rotor and these results can be used for the optimal design of HTS bearings of the 10kWh SFESs.

• Proceedings of the Korea Institute of Applied Superconductivity and Cryogenics Conference
• /
• 2000.02a
• /
• pp.180-184
• /
• 2000

The dymanic properties of the high-Tc superconductor journal bearings used in the KEPRI flywheel energy storage system was experimentally estimated by using the imbalance excitation method. The test reveals that the superconductor bearings have very low stiffness compared to that of typical oil film bearings with similar geometry and almost the same amount of damping as in roller bearings, which may not be helpful for the system to pass through the critical speeds. However, it was found out that the cross-coupled stiffness and damping terms were almost negligible so that the system could be more stable than the one using lil film bearings. Also with proper design of the rotor-bearing system and accurate balancing of the rotor, the high-Tc superconductor bearing is one of the most viable alternatives to the conventional ones due to its oil-free, non-contact running capability in a vacuum environment, which is literally essential for highly efficient flywheel energy storage systems.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
• /
• v.34 no.11
• /
• pp.1757-1763
• /
• 2010

Flywheel energy storage system (FESS) is defined as a high speed rotating flywheel system that can save surplus electric power. The FESS is proposed as an efficient energy storage system because it can accumulate a large amount of energy when it is operated at a high rotating speed and no mechanical problems are encountered. The FESS consists of a shaft, flywheel, motor/generator, bearings, and case. It is difficult to simulate rotor dynamics using common structure simulation programs because these programs are based on the 3D model and complex input rotating conditions. Therefore, in this paper, a program for the FESS based on the 2D FEM was developed. The 2D FEM can model easier than 3D, and it can present the multi-layer rotor with different material each other. Stiffness changing of the shaft caused by shrink fitting of the hub can be inputted to get clear solving results. The results obtained using the program were compared with those obtained using the common programs to determine any errors.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
• /
• v.3 no.1
• /
• pp.50-55
• /
• 2001

A new type of flywheel energy storage system that has a horizontal axle with High $T_c$, superconductor bearings using Y123 single-domained crystals was developed.The dynamic Properties, stiffness and damping of the high $T_c$, superconductor radial bearings were experimentally estimated using a imbalance excitation method. The imbalance excitation method applied to this rotor- bearing system identified the identified stiffness and damping of the high temperature superconductor beatings to be 2.8 $3.3 {\times} 10^5 N/m and 775 204$ Nsec/m respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
• /
• 1997.04a
• /
• pp.272-277
• /
• 1997

The axial bearing using two ring type permanent magnets to support the weight of a flywheel is proposed to reduce the bearing loss in a flywheel energy storage , system. Two permanent magnet makes stable force in axial direction but unstable force in lateral direction. The lateral unstable stiffness is identified quantitatively using flux analysis, and then through the rotor dynamic analysis on a rigid flywheel system the unstable effects on the system by the stiffness is investigated.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
• /
• 2006.07b
• /
• pp.907-908
• /
• 2006

The energy storage systems are being widely researched for the electric power. The operations running in a vacuum chamber mainly consists of a composite flywheel rotor, superconductor bearings, a motor/generator and its controller. Among composed the apparatus, the floating magnet bearing consists of the ring-type permanent magnets with epoxy resin impregnation for reinforcement and surface protection. In order to storage as much energy as possible, the flywheel is supposed to be rotated with very high speed. The magnetic field is analyzed by using the Maxwell 2D/3D for the simulations.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
• /
• v.25 no.10
• /
• pp.99-106
• /
• 2008

5kWh FESS(Flywheel Energy Storage System) using AMB(Active Magnetic Bearing) has been under development and 1st trial system has been finished and run the operating test. Unfortunately, the test result was not satisfactory because FESS could increase the rotational speed up to 9,000 rpm only although the target rotational speed is 18,000rpm. It's because 1st bending mode frequency of flywheel shaft was too low and imbalance response was too big. To achieve the target speed, 1st bending mode and imbalance response must be improved and the whole FESS needed to be designed again. This paper presents the newly designed FESS and what has been changed from the 1st trial FESS to improve 1st bending mode and imbalance response. The experimental results to see how much 1st bending mode frequency was improved are presented, too.

• 한국초전도학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• v.9
• /
• pp.310-314
• /
• 1999

A prototype of Flywheel Energy Storage System with high Tc superconducting bearings was fabricated and tested to verify its applicability for the energy industry. The moment of inertia of assembled wheel with rotor magnets is about 1.072${\times}$10$^{-1}$ Kg-m$^2$. The wheel was designed to withstand its integrity up to the rotation speed of 20,000 rpm. YBCO bulk superconductors prepared by seed growth method were used as bearing to levitate and stabilize the rotating wheel. High speed rotation of the flywheel without mechanical contact was achieved by using specially designed Halbach type motor. The flywheel system showed very high stability during test operation performed up to the speed of about 10,000rpm. The energy loss measured by free decay test performed between 9,300 rpm and 7,000 rpm was calculated as about 45 W.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
• /
• 2001.05a
• /
• pp.514-520
• /
• 2001

A 300Wh class flywheel energy storage system using high Tc superconductor bearings(HTC SFES) is being developed by KIMM and KEPRI. HTC SFES consists of a flywheel rotor, superconductor bearings, a motor/generator and its controller, touch-down bearings, vacuum chamber, etc. Stiffness and damping values of superconductor bearings were experimentally estimated to be 67,700N/m and 29Ns/m respectively. The present HTC SFES was designed to have maximum operating speed of 33000 rpm, which is far above 2 rigid body mode critical speeds of 645rpm and 1,275rpm. Leaf-spring type touch-down bearing were utilized to have the system pass safely through the system critical speeds. It has been experimentally verified that the system can run stably up to 28,000 rpm so that HTC SFES is now expected to reach up to its maximum design speed of 33,000rpm without any difficulties. The Halbach array motor & generator has also been proven its effectiveness on transferring electrical energy to a rotaing composite flywheel in kinetic form.

• The Transactions of the Korean Institute of Power Electronics
• /
• v.5 no.6
• /
• pp.610-619
• /
• 2000

This paper presents an off-line UPS using the high temperature superconductive magnetic bearing. FES(Flywheel Energy Storage) system has good advantages in compare with lead acid battery. So, high efficiency FES using high temperature SMB(superconductive magnetic bearing) was composed in this paper. The outer rotor type of PMSM(Permanent Magnet Synchronous Motor) as motor/generator was used for the experiment, and square wave current and sinusoidal wave control methods was compared for high efficiency operation of motor/generator. The circuit for in phase sinusoidal wave current control with EMF in the full speed range was designed and the proposed flywheel energy storage system was applied in single phase off-line UPS system. As the stable operation characteristics of prototype system was confirmed, the its excellence as energy storage device in Off-line UPS was proved.