Westborough’s American Superconductor Corp. and Southern California Edison, California’s largest electric utility, will team up to test a new kind of high voltage surge protector on California’s electric grid, the companies said, with help from a Department of Energy cooperative agreement award.
The Department of Energy will provide AMSC with $3.1 million to fund the project through September of 2008. If certain project milestones are met, the DOE could provide up to $9.7 million in additional funding for implementation of the project through 2012, the company said.
The two companies will test a new transmission-voltage fault current limiter that uses AMSC high temperature superconductor wires. Fault current limiters act as surge protectors to improve system reliability and efficiency, according to AMSC.
