Enhancement of YBCO Coated Conductor Performance by In Situ Chemical Pinning

Advanced coated conductor development for high current carrying capacity HTS wires and tapes requires a high current density and also a large YBCO film thickness in the coated conductor. The inclusion of secondary phase particles, i.e., Chemical Pinning, is a highly viable approach to increase Jc from a production point of view, especially since in our application of metal organic chemical vapour deposition to coated conductor development, the chemical pinning step can be performed in situ during the growth of the superconducting layer without adding another step to a technological scheme. This Phase II proposal will encompass the deposition of extended lengths of YBCO coated conductor onto continuously moving buffered metallic substrates, with the integration of the Chemical Pinning approach to increase Jc through the incorporation of Y2O3 secondary phase nano-inclusions, as well as through the growth of thick YBCO layers (~ 10 m), in order to enhance the coated conductor performance to the 1,000 A/cm-width level. The existing MetOx MOCVD facilities will be utilized in the fabrication of a quantity of 10+ metres of the high performance YBCO tape. In addition, the Phase II plan will include the winding of pancake coils to test the performance of the coated conductor in actual coil configurations.