(Yicai) Oct. 19 -- Shanghai Superconductor Technology has announced the structural completion of its second-generation high-temperature superconducting tape production base and headquarters complex.

Once fully completed and operational, the project will produce 15,000 kilometers of 12-millimeter-wide HTS tape annually, Shanghai Superconductor’s President Zhu Jiamin said at a ceremony yesterday. It will be capable of producing the world’s first single tape up to three km long.

The project is located in the Zhangjiang High-Tech Park in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone in Pudong New Area and has a total investment cost of CNY2.5 billion (USD374 million).

“A single three-km HTS tape can greatly reduce the number of joints during use, improving the system reliability of superconducting cable long-distance laying and large magnet winding,” Zhu noted, adding that achieving stable output quality of three-km HTS tape will be very difficult and will test the company’s overall capabilities.

The project is expected to start producing three-km HTS tape in the first quarter of next year and reach full production capacity in 2029, bringing Shanghai Superconductor Technology's total annual production capacity of second-generation HTS tape to 20,000 km, ranking first globally.

“Downstream application scenarios for HTS tape are continuously expanding,” Zhu said. “Both nuclear fusion and superconducting cables have very strong demand for this material.” 

For instance, a single compact tokamak device may require between several thousand and tens of thousands of km of superconducting tape, opening up unprecedented growth potential in demand for HTS materials, according to Zhu.

Founded in 2011, Shanghai Superconductor is headquartered in Zhangjiang High-Tech Park. It is China’s leading supplier of second-generation HTS tape, with a domestic market share of more than 80 percent. It is also one of the world’s only two companies with annual shipments of over 1,000 km.

Shanghai Superconductor’s customers include global leaders in controllable nuclear fusion, many domestic commercial fusion firms and research institutes, and superconducting cable demonstration projects in Shanghai and Shenzhen.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Futura Costaglione