Towards Faster FEM Simulation of Thin Film Superconductors: A Multiscale Approach

This work presents a method to simulate the electromagnetic properties of superconductors with high aspect ratio such as the commercially available second generation superconducting YBCO tapes. The method is based on a multiscale representation for both thickness and width of the superconducting domains. A couple of test cases were successfully simulated and further investigations were made by means of structured (mapped) meshes. Here, large aspect ratio elements were used to simulate thin material layers with a reduced number of elements. Hence, more complex geometries can be studied at considerable lower computational time. Several test cases were simulated including transport current, externally applied magnetic field and a combination of both. The results are in good agreement with recently published numerical simulations. The computational time to solve the present multiscale approach in 2D is estimated as two orders of magnitude faster than other 2D methods.