Quench protection of the 16 T Nb3Sn dipole magnets designed for the Future Circular Collider

Three different 16 T dipole magnet options for the Future Circular Collider (FCC) have been designed within the H2020 EuroCirCol collaboration, namely a cosθ-, a block-, and a common-coil -type of magnet. All magnets were designed using the same constraints related to magnetic field, cable parameters, mechanics, and quench protection. The quench protection analysis during the magnet design was centralized and done for all the options using the same tools and methods. This paper summarizes the final conceptual protection schemes. They are based either on the novel CLIQ-technology (Coupling Loss Induced Quench) or on traditional quench heaters. We compare the performance of the protection systems and show that while both can protect the magnet at nominal operation current, CLIQ is more efficient in reducing peak temperatures than heaters, and the system operation is simpler due to smaller amount of protection units. Therefore, CLIQ has been chosen as the baseline protection option for the FCC dipole magnets. The future development of heaters is considered as a back-up option.