SF 6 passive resonance DC circuit breaker combined with a superconducting fault current limiter

Superconducting current limiters (SFCLs) can limit short-circuit fault current and provide sufficient time for DC circuit breakers (DCCBs) to isolate faults. An SF ₆ passive resonance DCCB combined with a superconducting current-limiting module and a DC interruption module is proposed due to the high current interruption properties and the low on-state loss. However, experimental investigations of SF ₆ passive resonance DCCBs combined with SFCLs using DC source are currently lacking. The objective of this paper is to obtain the interruption characteristics and modeling design methods of the proposed SF ₆ passive resonance DCCB. This paper designs a 10 kV SF ₆ passive resonance DCCB and tests the DCCB in a 10 kV/10 kA circuit. Quenching resistance and arc models are established based on experimental results. Experimental results show that the superconducting current-limiting module responds fast at 0.3 ms and limits the DC fault current of 10 kA to a peak of 816 A. Then the DC interruption module interrupts the limited current successfully. Besides, there is no overvoltage afterward in all the tests because the superconducting current-limiting module absorbs much of the energy during the interruption. The proposed DCCB would be an effective method for interrupting short-circuit faults in high voltage DC systems.