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Fusion Energy Conference 2018: Can We Harness the Energy that Powers the Sun?
The 27th IAEA Fusion Energy Conference is being organized by the IAEA in cooperation with the Department of Atomic Energy, Government of India and the Institute for Plasma Research, at the Mahatma Mandir, Gandhinagar (Ahmedabad) Gujarat, India.
Previous conferences in this series were held in Salzburg (1961), Culham (1965), Novosibirsk (1968), Madison (1971), Tokyo (1974), Berchtesgaden (1976), Innsbruck (1978), Brussels (1980), Baltimore (1982), London (1984), Kyoto (1986), Nice (1988), Washington DC (1990), Würzburg (1992), Seville (1994), Montreal (1996), Yokohama (1998), Sorrento (2000), Lyon (2002), Vilamoura (2004), Chengdu (2006), Geneva (2008), Daejeon (2010), San Diego (2012), Saint Petersburg (2014) and Kyoto (2016).
For the past ten years, cumulative average growth rate for electricity generation in India has been close to 6%. During the year 2016-17, total electricity generation was about than 1430 billion kW-hour or TW-hour. It will be more than 1500 TW-hour in 2017-18. Considering rate of economic growth, linkage between economic growth and electricity requirements, increasing urbanisation and current low per capita electricity availability, electricity generation in India is likely to exceed 8000 TW-hour by the middle of this century. Environmental sustainability enjoins on India to generate a significant fraction of the total generation by low-carbon technologies that is nuclear, hydro, solar and wind. Considering that total potential of hydro, solar and wind is only about one-fourth of the projected electricity requirements, nuclear must play a dominant role.
The talk will explain near- and medium-term plans to accelerate growth in installed nuclear capacity, and provide a glimpse of ongoing research and development aimed at directing growth in installed capacity in the long-term.
Recognizing the limitations of currently available resources, India’s quest for new energy sources is common for all nations, which are in a state of rapid growth and aspire to seek a respectable place on the global canvas of peaceful and sustainable co-existence. Lack of adequate energy denies opportunity to lead a developed and precludes realization of human potential into what it could have been. The global impact can be gauged from the fact that among the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, spelt out after an extensive study by the UN, the 7th Goal is about ‘affordable and clean energy’. Today or in very near future – the whole world is or will be in a situation that will require every conceivable energy source to be tapped, improved in efficiency, made cost-effective and be equipped with a method to mitigate any adverse impact on the environment.
In spite of India’s taking significant steps towards tapping every bit of both conventional and renewable energy sources, the demand is much higher than what is currently available and is still growing. If one takes a grand challenge of bringing parity with the world-average for the per capita consumption, the capacity has to be trebled! How fast can one add ~400 GW? No matter what we do and however staggering this figure is, there is no going back from this target. So, an equally challenging problem that emerges is how do we manage to grow on sub-optimal energy supply in the interim period. Techniques to reduce energy consumption by increasing efficiency of various processes need to be developed. For this one needs new tools, materials and research-infrastructure to innovate, improvise and harness the benefits of improvement on a mass-scale. Scales matter; even a tiny saving/improvement for a nation with billion people is quite impactful.
Advanced technologies like fusion hold the promise but have been traditionally considered too far away for any serious investment so far. The ‘fear factor’ of failure can be overpowering for policy makers. However, it’s time to turn it around and ask ourselves: What difference will it make if fusion reactor works as desired? Well, it will make a tremendous difference. It deserves a try, just for that hope we have. The ITER Project is a collective expression of this global quest for energy in the form of the largest scientific endeavour involving more than half of the world population. The task however, is complex and embeds challenges of extreme kind. But fusion research is also all about innovative ways and can continue to provide the world with spin-offs while it graduates from hydrogen plasma to D-T and from there on to power-reactors.
India has come a long way in both fusion-science and technology via its well-conceived indigenous as well as collaborative measures. India’s journey began in 1982 and it has grown in several areas of plasma and fusion research. A number of developments has taken place: tokamaks with copper-coils (ADITYA) and with superconducting coils (SST-1) have been built indigenously in the Institute for Plasma Research, Gandhinagar. The scientists have gained enormous experience in plasma operations of these tokamaks as well as in SINP-tokamak, which is located in the Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics, Kolkata. Now, an upgraded ADITYA-U is in place capable of experiments with shaped plasma. A host of auxiliary technologies have been developed and tested with the test-beds created in-house.
India needs to sustain the momentum of its fusion research to be able to reap the benefits from participation in ITER and to quickly channelize the success of ITER in its vision. The ITER participation has been followed in India with the blanket and the divertor technology development initiatives. Industrial applications of the plasma have come off age and last but not the least, the human resource development has taken place with a strong academic back-bone. In this talk, the above-mentioned developments are overviewed and an outline of the future plan --and how it blends with ITER participation is also presented.
Research and Innovation contributes to several of the ten priorities of the European Commission for 2015-19. The EU's energy research policy contributes, in particular, to provide its citizens and businesses with secure and affordable energy, while also addressing the causes of climate change.
The next Research and Innovation Programme, covering the period 2021-2027, will build on the success of the current Programme (Horizon 2020) under the guiding principle of 'evolution, not revolution'.
Intensified international cooperation under the next Programme will ensure that European researchers and innovators have access to and benefit from the world’s best talent, expertise and resources. This will, inter alia, enhance the supply and demand of innovative solutions and promote reciprocal international research partnerships.
In the area of Fusion Research the implementation of the 'Roadmap to the Realisation of Fusion Energy' will continue to be the priority focus, with a strong and continued support for the construction of ITER and a significant research effort to prepare for DEMO.
The time and cost of further increasing the overall readiness level of fusion energy, which requires testing materials under extreme environment, data collection, analysis and new designs, can be significantly reduced with the advent of the fourth industrial revolution. The fourth industrial revolution is on its way. Known as Industry 4.0, it represents the current trend to use automation and data exchange technologies that include cyber-physical systems, the Internet of things, cloud computing and cognitive computing. These technologies are rapidly being developed to perform industry activities. Components of future fusion reactors are expected to be designed and manufactured by using advanced simulation technologies and advanced manufacturing methods. The costs will be further reduced as there will be increased harmonisation of codes and standards. IAEA have already taken steps to ensure that the design rules are harmonised before the technology is commercialised. In case of the fission technology there was commercialisation before harmonisation but for fusion technology it will be harmonisation before commercialisation.
above 0.2 MPa, Pped ~ 80 kPa). The highest pedestals are obtained by accessing the super H-mode regime predicted by EPED enabling C-Mod to demonstrate Pped at 90% of the ITER target. Data from a multi-machine database shows that the boundary heat flux width scales inversely with Bp, independent of machine size. The most recent data have extended this scaling to Bp=1.3 T, beyond that envisioned for ITER, and the 1/Bp scaling persists. Based on these results, it is clear that power handling in reactors will be an even bigger challenge than in ITER, arguing for the urgent need for one or more dedicated Divertor Test Tokamaks (DTT). Laser blow-off induced cold-pulses, an enigmatic transient phenomenon that has challenged the standard local-transport paradigm, has been explained by a new local turbulent transport model. Results from the TRANSP power balance code, coupled to the quasilinear transport model TGLF-SAT1, with a new saturation rule that came about from cross-scale coupling physics, and that captures the nonlinear upshift of the critical gradient, are shown to describe the cold-pulse, including the existence of core temperature inversions at low density and disappearance at high density. A Random Forests Machine Learning algorithm, has been trained on thousands of C-Mod discharges to detect disruption events. Disruption evolution time scales on C-Mod are relatively short, and this approach gives reliable warning no more than a few ms before disruption. Warning time-scales on larger plasmas are generally longer, good news for reactor applications. Steady-state tokamak reactors will need high bootstrap fraction, supplemented by RF current drive. Lower Hybrid Current Drive is among the most efficient non-inductive techniques. Recent modeling indicates that moving the launch point to the high field side can have many benefits, including accessibility at lower n|| for higher efficiency.
Indirect drive converts high power laser into x rays using small high-Z cavities called hohlraums. X rays generated at the hohlraum walls drive a capsule filled with DT fusion fuel. Recent experiments have produced fusion yields exceeding 50 kJ where alpha heating provides ~3x increase in yield over PdV work. Comparison of the results to the common Lawson criterion suggests the current implosions performance is ~30% from conditions expected to initiate thermonuclear gain. Improvements to close the gap on the last ~30% are challenging requiring optimization of the target/implosions and the laser to extract maximum energy. The US program has a three-pronged approach to maximize target performance each closing some portion of the gap. The first item is optimizing the hohlraum to couple more energy to the capsule while maintaining symmetry control. Novel hohlraum designs are being pursued that enable larger capsule to be driven symmetrically to both reduce 3D effects and increase energy coupled to the capsule. The second issue being addressed is capsule stability. Seeding of instabilities by the hardware used to mount the capsule and fill it with DT fuel remains a concern. Work such reducing the impact of the DT fill tubes and novel capsule mounts such as three sets of two single wire stands forming a cage, as opposed to the thin membranes currently used, are being pursed to reduce the effect of mix on the capsule implosions. There is also growing evidence native capsule seeds such as micro-structure may be playing a role on limiting capsule performance and dedicated experiments are being developed to better understand the phenomenon. The last area of emphasis is the laser. As technology progresses and understanding of laser damage/mitigation advances, increasing the laser energy to as much as 2.6 Megajoulse at 351 nm and increasing the laser power to 600 TW seems possible. This would increase the amount of energy available to couple to the capsule and allow larger capsules potentially increasing the hot spot pressure and confinement time. The combination of each of these focus areas have the potential to produce conditions to initiate thermo-nuclear ignition. The current understanding, status, and plans for near term research in each of these areas will be presented in the context of what is believed to be needed to obtain burning plasmas on NIF.
A. Technologies for manufacturing of small and medium size Ion source (upto four RF driver) for positive and negative neutral beam systems have been evolved over last many decades and such ion sources are being successfully operated at various experimental facilities across the world. However, as the need arises for the larger size ion sources (eight driver) for ITER diagnostics and heating neutral beam systems, several existing manufacturing technologies and considerations have to upgraded and re-evaluated to qualify them for (1) highest vacuum quality class (2) nuclear environment.
Diagnostic Neutral Beam (DNB) source is the first candidate in a family of such big size ion sources, being manufactured according to the ITER specification with ‘re-evaluated’ manufacturing technologies and it throws light on many unforeseen challenges as manufacturing progresses. The nature of challenges are mainly related to usage of the material with radioprotection requirement (i.e restricted contents of Co wt%0.05, Nb wt %0.01 and Ta wt %0.01), special requirements on weld joint configuration to enable full penetration with 100% volumetric inspectability, dissimilar material welding technologies, machining process development to meet stringent dimensional accuracies (in the range of 10-50 microns) of individual ‘angled’ grid segment to achieve overall alignment of +/-0.2mm, electro-deposition of copper with thickness>3mm over the angled surfaces with control over distortion, vacuum brazing, restricted usage of Silver for brazing and plating purpose, development of electrical isolators with customized electrostatic shield, threaded connection between metal and alumina load carrying capacity of 10kN with electrical isolation of 140kV in vacuum.
The paper shall present experience gathered in development of above mentioned manufacturing technologies, the methodology adopted for mitigating the practical limitations, prototyping to establish and qualify the manufacturing procedure, evaluating the non-conformities, assessment of deviation proposals, in compliance with ITER specifications. In summary, the experience generated during the manufacturing of DNB Beam source, presented here, is aimed to help in generating the recipe manufacturing and providing the ‘re-evaluated’ technical specifications for upcoming ITER neutral beam sources.
B. The ITER Heating Neutral Beam (HNB) injectors, one of the tools necessary both to achieve burning conditions and to control plasma instabilities, are characterized by such demanding parameters as to require the construction of a test facility dedicated to their development and optimization. This facility, called NBTF, is in an advanced state of realization in Padua (Italy), with the direct contribution of the Italian government, through the Consorzio RFX as the host entity, IO, the in kind contributions of three DA’s (F4E, JADA, INDA) and the technical and scientific support of various European laboratories and universities. The NBTF hosts two experiments: SPIDER and MITICA. The former is devoted to the optimization of the HNB and DNB ion sources and to the achievement of the required source performances. It is based on the RF negative Ion Source concept developed at IPP (Garching). MITICA is the full size prototype of the ITER HNB, with an ion source identical to the one used in SPIDER. The construction and installation of SPIDER plant systems was successfully completed with their integration into the facility, followed by integrated commissioning with control (CODAS), protection and safety systems. The mechanical components of the ion source have been installed inside the vessel and connected to the plants. Finally, the integrated commissioning of the whole system ended positively and the first experimental phase began. Also the realization of the MITICA project is well advanced, although the completion of the system and its entry into operation is expected in 2022 due to the long procurement times of the in-vessel mechanical components. In particular, the power supply designed to operate at 1MV are in an advanced phase of realization, all the high voltage components have been installed and the complex insulation test phase has begun in 2018. Furthermore, all the other auxiliary plant systems are being installed and / or undergoing testing. This paper gives an overview of the progress of the NBTF realization with particular emphasis on issues discovered during this phase of activities and to the adopted solutions in order to minimize the impact on the schedule while maintaining the goals of the facilities. Finally, the first results obtained with SPIDER experimentation and with the 1MV insulation tests on the MITICA HV components will be presented.
C. For the ITER neutral beam (NB) system, a measure to achieve the 1 MV vacuum insulation of the beam source have been developed. For this purpose, design basis for 1 MV vacuum insulation has been developed by integrating previous empirical scaling for plane and coaxial electrodes and new scaling for area with locally-concentrated electric field. Consequently, as the measure, the beam source is surrounded by more than three intermediate electrostatic shields instead of single gap to sustain 1 MV. Effectiveness of the shields designed by the design basis was experimentally verified by using a part of the beam source. The voltage holding capability has been significantly improved from 0.7 MV to 1 MV. This result ensures the 1 MV vacuum insulated beam source in the ITER NB system.
The Chinese Fusion Engineering Test Reactor (CFETR), complementing ITER, is aiming to demonstrate fusion energy production up to 200 MW initially and to eventually reach DEMO relevant power level, to manifest high duty factor of 0.3~0.5, and to pursuit tritium self-sufficiency with tritium breeding ratio (TBR) > 1. The key challenge to meet the missions of the CFETR is to run the machine in steady state and high duty factor. Recently, a self-consistent steady-state scenario for CFETR with fully sustained non-inductive current drive is developed using a multi-dimensional code suite with physics-based models. In addition, results from the experimental validation conducted by a recent EAST steady-state experiment with off-axis current drive enhance confidence in the performance prediction from the integrated modeling. Finally, a fully non-inductive reverse-shear scenario scaled to R = 6.7 m, βN~3, H98 ~ 1.5 and fBS ~ 0.75 with the performance that meets the high gain CFETR mission is demonstrated. The scenario presents a self-consistent solution for the CFETR transport, equilibrium and pedestal dynamics.
At present, the CFETR physics design focuses on optimization of the third evolution CFETR (R = 7 m, a = 2 m, kappa = 2, Bt = 6.5-7 T, Ip = 13 MA) consistent with steady-state or hybrid mode and a radiative divertor. Listed below are the main tasks we needed to tackle in the near-term, e.g. to demonstrate compatibility with the alpha particle stability and transport, and to quantify the tritium burn-up rate during the steady-state burning plasma phase in order to find a solution to meet the central fueling requirement, and so on. The details will be given in this meeting
In tokamaks, baking of vacuum vessel and first wall components is a prerequisite in order to obtain impurity free plasmas. Baking is performed to remove impurities viz. H2, H2O and Hydro-Carbon from the vessel and first wall components. ADITYA tokamak has been upgraded ADITYA-U tokamak to achieve shaped plasmas. The ADITYA-U is equipped with a comprehensive baking system for heating the SS vacuum vessel, pumping systems, associated diagnostics along with the graphite limiter and diverter tiles up to 150 C. The DC Glow discharge cleaning is also carried out in presence of baking to achieve better wall conditioning for high performance plasma operation. Due to space limitation between vessel and Toroidal field coils at the high-field side, 1.5 mm thick silicon heaters has been designed and procured. In-situ installation of heaters has been quite challenging due to structural complexity. For efficient heat insulation, 6 mm thick silicon jacket designed, fabricated and installed according to vessel profile. A detail analysis carried out in ANSYS for its optimum performance and to examine its effect on vessel, especially on the several weld joints. Whole baking system consists of ~80 heaters installed on different sectors of the vessel, pumps and diagnostics. The heaters are controlled in close loop by in-house developed Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) based automatic control system. It comprises of three main phases, temperature ramp-up, constant heating and ramp-down to room temperature. All these phases are individually controlled as required. The entire baking system has been tested thoroughly for its automatic operations for long hours(~48 hr.), integration, ruggedness, reliability, small form factor. The detailed hardware concept, software design and prototype testing and its regular operation in presence and absence of GDC will be discussed. Partial pressure of impurities is monitored in every baking cycle which decides the controls of the baking temperature and duration automatically. Further, the potency of lithiumization carried out before, during and after baking has been compared for the first time in ADITYA-U by estimating the lithium lifetime on the walls with plasma operation. The improved wall conditioning with baking and its effect on plasma operation along with technical challenges faced during installation will be presented in this paper.
Tungsten (W) will be used in ITER as a Plasma Facing Material (PFM) in divertor due to its capability to handle high heat flux while having a low Hydrogen (H) isotope affinity. However in presence of fusion neutrons and alpha particles, tungsten can accumulate radiation damage, which might significantly enhance its H retention property. In order to investigate the effects of radiation damage on Deuterium (D) trapping in tungsten, we have carried out experiments using D beam in pre and post irradiated polycrystalline tungsten foils. In this paper we present the comparison of D depth profile measurements using Elastic Recoil Detection Analysis (ERDA) and Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy (SIMS) technique.
Polycrystalline tungsten foil samples of size 8mmx8mmx0.1mm foils were mechanically polished and annealed at 1838 K to release the stress and to minimize the defects. These foils were further irradiated with gold ion (80 MeV), boron ions (10 MeV) to create defects. These samples were then exposed to a D beam of 100keV energy for a fluence of 5x1017 ions/cm2. The trapped D was measured using ERDA and SIMS, and the depth profiles were modelled using binary collisions Monte Carlo method by including the surface roughness. The preliminary results show the enhancement in amount of trapped D in pre-damaged tungsten samples in contrast to the undamaged ones. The effect of Helium (He) on D trapping in sample was also analyzed and it was observed that D trapping is reduced in presence of He. The details of experiments and the analysis will be presented.
The Electromagnetic Particle Injector (EPI) has the potential for delivering the radiative payload to the plasma center on a 3-4 ms time scale, much faster, and deeper, than what can be achieved using present methods. Predicting and controlling disruptions is an important and urgent issue for ITER. While a primary focus is the early prediction and avoidance of conditions favorable to a disruption, it is understood that some disruptions may be inescapable. For these cases, a fast time response method is essential to protect the ITER facility. Experimental tests on a proto-type system have been able to verify the predicted rapid response capability of the EPI system by accelerating a 3.2 g sabot to 150 m/s in 1.5 ms.
The primary advantage of the EPI concept over present systems is its ability to meet short warning time scales while accurately delivering a radiative payload composed of acceptable low-Z materials such as Be, B or BN. This is done at velocities of ≥ 1 km/s required to achieve core penetration in high power ITER discharges, thus providing thermal and runaway current mitigation. This capability will provide the means for initiating a controlled plasma termination that originates at the plasma center, rather than from the outer periphery. This added capability, in addition to the fast time-response capability, should provide greater flexibility in controlling tokamak disruptions.
*This work is supported by U.S. DOE Contracts: DE-AC02-09CH11466, DE-FG02-99ER54519 AM08, and DE-SC0006757.
In general, the operation of AC discharges in small tokamaks requires the control of a few external parameters such as vertical and horizontal fields, external heating (where available), chamber conditioning and gas puff. The dynamics and type of control used are mostly based on experimental empirical learning, with different combinations of actuators depending on the tokamak device. Experimental studies performed during the AC operation in the ISTTOK tokamak have addressed the influence of several control parameters in the success of the AC transition. Although the link between the different external actuators and plasma discharge evolution could be verified, successful AC transitions above 4 kA plasma current could not be achieved. In order to build a more predictive control of the AC transition it would be useful to develop a first principles model which interprets the experimental observations. Such model would need to combine experimental data and calculations on the equilibria and stability in several time stamps of the transition, current profile evolution, ramp-up and runaway generation, drift electrons, and the electro-technical properties of the tokamak during AC operation. The output of such model would inform the discharge controller how to balance evolution of the external actuators during the AC transition.
The present paper presents an initial step towards the development of a deeper understanding of the equilibria and current profile during the AC transition in ISTTOK. The goal of the present study is to identify the topology of flux surfaces based on experimental pressure-like measurements and matched current profiles, the existence (or not) of antiparallel plasma currents during transition and the existence of drifting electrons and their role during current ramp-up. There is also experimental evidence on the presence of fast electrons (possibly a significant run-away fraction) playing an important role during the initial stages of the discharge immediately after the transition. This will be further investigated using colisonless numerical simulations to determine the maximum lifetime of the drift electrons and their response to H-V fields. It is important to use this electron population in combination with gas puff to produce a more efficient Townsend avalanche during the current ramp-up.
Turbulence spreading is the transfer of free turbulent energy from strongly driven (i.e., unstable regions) to weakly driven locations [1]. The net effect of this phenomenon is the radial redistribution of turbulent energy, modifying local plasma features. It has been pointed out that spreading may be important in setting the Scrape-Off Layer (SOL) width. The peak heat load onto the divertor is intimately related to the SOL width, and the understanding of the mechanisms setting this width is fundamental for a reliable prediction of the SOL decay length for ITER. In this work, we report on measurements of turbulence drive and turbulent spreading, as defined by Manz, P. et al [2], from the near edge to the far SOL region of TJ-II. A 2-D Langmuir probe array [3] was used to measure both parameters as well as the profiles of floating potential, plasma density, radial turbulent particle flux, effective radial velocity, potential turbulence correlation time and phase velocity of the fluctuations. The radial electric field in the edge was modified by a biasing electrode, inserted into the edge of the plasma ($\rho \approx 0.85$), delivering a voltage $\pm$ 350 V (with respect to the wall), with a square 40 Hz waveform. All the parameters were modulated by the biasing. At -350 V, the velocity shear reached its maximum, resulting in a strong suppression of turbulent transport and the effective radial velocity fluctuations, not only at the shear layer, but also in the far SOL. Moreover, the ion saturation profile steepened at the shear layer location and was reduced in the SOL. The local turbulence drive and turbulence spreading were also impacted by the biasing. The driving term was strongly reduced in the shear layer, and only slightly reduced in the SOL. Turbulence spreading was mainly modified in the SOL when the $E_r\times B$ shear reached values close to the inverse of the turbulence correlation time in the vicinity of the Last Close Flux Surface (LCFS). In summary, biasing was found to reduce edge-SOL coupling by decreasing turbulence spreading, thus affecting the ion saturation current profile, which may have an impact on the SOL width. [1] X. Garbet et al., Nucl. Fusion 34 (1994) 963. [2] P. Manz P. et al., Phys. Plasmas 22 (2015) 022308. [3] J. Alonso. et al., Nucl. Fusion 52 (2012) 063010.
For a burning plasma device like ITER, radiative power removal by seeded impurities will be inevitable to avoid divertor damage. Increasing divertor radiation by injecting low-Z impurities such as nitrogen, to reduce scrape-off layer heat flux and to cool the divertor plasma to detachment, is put forward as the primary method to achieve this goal. Here, the possibility of increasing the radiative fraction is assessed by using poloidal magnetic flux expansion. Initial ohmic and nitrogen seeded H-mode High Flux Expansion (HFE) experiments, characterized by the presence of 2-nearby poloidal magnetic field nulls and a contracting geometry near the inner target plate have been recently achieved at JET tokamak In this contribution the physics of the dependence of radiative volume and total radiated power on flux expansion variation at JET, equipped with ITER-like Wall (ILW), will be addressed. EDGE2D-EIRENE simulations have already shown that the divertor heat fluxes can be reduced with N2-injection, qualitatively consistent with experimental observations, by adjusting the impurity injection rate to reproduce the measured divertor radiation. Through EDGE2D-EIRENE code modelling, a detailed analysis of the power balance has been set up to physically investigate the reason of the increase of the radiated power for HFE discharges. An increase of charge exchange losses has been related to an increase of connection length and flux expansion both at X-point at strike points position. Spectroscopy data suggests that there is evidence of a detachment front moving towards the X-point from both the movement of the electron density and the low charge nitrogen charge states as the flux expansion increases. Initial experiments with a second null, on the high field side, forming a configuration with significant distance between the two nulls and a contracting geometry near the target plates have been performed leading to an increase of the main magnetic divertor geometry parameters. In addition, nitrogen seeded H-mode experiments have been set-up showing an increase of the total radiated power of the same factor of the flux expansion increase. Further experiments will be devoted to varying the divertor coils polarities to move the secondary x-point on the low field side region and consequently increase the outer flux expansion both in the x-point and strike point region.
In the ITER, an important aspect of qualifying the components to the mandatory regulatory requirements, the system developers have a challenge to first design the components fulfilling guidelines of the ITER recommended French nuclear code RCC-MR (2007) and later on demonstrate to the regulator. It is even more involving for systems that are extending primary vacuum to the interspace and port-cell as these zones are accessible by a human. The paper addresses such requirements in the thermal design of the X-Ray Crystal Spectroscopy-Survey (XRCS-Survey) system, which is a first plasma diagnostic.
The XRCS-Survey is a broadband (1 - 100 Å) X-ray crystal spectrometer for real-time monitoring of absolute concertation and in-flux of the plasma impurities. For measurements, the transport of x-ray emission is done using a nearly 10m long sight-tube directly connecting the spectrometer to the closure plate of the port-plug. The sight-tube components, classified as Protection Important Components due to their function in confinement of radioactive tritium and dust, are subjected to various thermal loads while machine operations. These loads are mostly due to baking to achieve ultra-high vacuum inside the ITER vacuum vessel. Furthermore, the components are also subjected to a neutron, gamma radiation of D-T fusion.
For reliable performance and safe operation of XRCS-Survey diagnostic, a preliminary engineering design and ANSYS analysis of the XRCS-Survey sight-tube components have been performed, with and without radiation shielding, in order to analyze the behavior of components under baking heat loads, operational heat loads and also accidental fire heat loads.
The paper presents an optimized design layout for the sight-tube of XRCS Survey and results of the thermal analysis; defining temperature limits to observe compliance with safety criterion defined by ITER regulatory guidelines on PIC (class SIC-1) components as well as providing inputs to the structural integrity analysis of the system.
Future devices like JT-60SA, ITER and DEMO require quantitative predictions of pedestal density and temperature levels, as well as divertor heat fluxes, to improve global confinement capabilities while preventing divertor erosion/melting in the planning of future experiments. Such predictions can be obtained from non-linear MHD codes like JOREK, for which systematic validation against current experiments is necessary. In this paper, we show the validation of ELM simulations with JOREK using quantitative comparison against JT-60U experiments. Note this is the first JOREK validation of ELM simulations at exact Spitzer resistivity. In addition, we demonstrate the essential importance of the separatrix position, required for a successful agreement with experimental data. On the basis of this validation, we propose estimates of ELM size, ELM-induced divertor heat-fluxes, and pre-ELM pedestal pressure, for future JT-60SA scenarios.
Key plasma physics and real-time control elements needed for robustly stable operation of high fusion power discharges in ITER have been demonstrated in US fusion research. Optimization of the current density profile has enabled passively stable operation without n=1 tearing modes in discharges simulating ITER’s baseline scenario with zero external torque. Stable rampdown of the discharge has been achieved with ITER-like scaled current ramp rates, while maintaining an X-point configuration. Significant advances have been made toward real-time prediction of disruptions: machine learning techniques for prediction of disruptions have achieved 90% accuracy in offline analysis, and direct probing of ideal and resistive plasma stability using 3D magnetic perturbations has shown a rising plasma response before the onset of a tearing mode. Active stability control contributes to prevention of disruptions, including direct stabilization of resistive-wall kink modes in high beta discharges, forced rotation of magnetic islands to prevent wall locking, and localized heating/current drive to shrink the islands. These elements are being integrated into stable operating scenarios and a new event-handling system for off-normal events in order to develop the physics basis and techniques for robust control in ITER.
Work supported by US DOE under DE-FC02-04ER54698, DE-SC0008520, DE-SC0016372, DE-FG02-04ER54761, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-SC0015878, DE-SC0014264, DE-FG02-99ER54524, DE-FOA-0001498, DE-AC02-09CH11466, DE-FC02-99ER54512, DE-SC0010720, DE-SC0010492, and the DOE Computational Science Graduate Fellowship, and by the EUROfusion Consortium with funding through FuseNet from the Euratom research and training programme 2014-2018 under Grant Agreement No. 633053. The views and opinions expressed herein do not necessarily reflect those of the European Commission.
The results of a set of simulations of Alfvén modes driven by an energetic particle population are presented, with the specific aim of comparing energetic particle radial transport between single-n and multiple-n simulations. The hybrid reduced O($\epsilon^3_0$) MHD gyrokinetic code HMGC is used, retaining both fluid (wave-wave) and energetic particles nonlinearities. The code HMGC retains self-consistently, in the time evolution, the wave spatial structures as modified by the energetic particle (EP) term.
A model equilibrium has been considered, rather than a specific experimental device, with the aim of studying how the dynamics of the EP driven Alfvénic modes changes when considering single-n or multiple-n simulations, while keeping all the other parameters fixed. A circular, shifted magnetic surface, static equilibrium has been considered, characterized by a large aspect ratio ($\epsilon_0= 0.1$) and a parabolic safety factor profile with $q_0=1.1$ and $q_a=1.9$ being, respectively, the on-axis and edge safety factor. A bulk ion density profile $n_i(r)$ ~ $(q_0/q(r))^{2}$ has also been assumed, in order to have the toroidal gap radially aligned, for all the mode considered. Regarding the EPs, an isotropic Maxwellian distribution function has been considered.
Simulations with toroidal mode numbers 1≤n≤15 have been considered. A variety of modes are observed (TAEs, upper and lower KTAEs, EPMs) during the linear growth phase. All the strongly unstable modes (4≤n≤12) exhibit pronounced (both up and down) frequency chirping at saturation. Nevertheless, no appreciable global modification of the energetic particle density profile is observed at saturation for the unstable modes.
On the contrary, multiple-n simulations, with the same Fourier toroidal mode spectrum of the set of single-n simulations, exhibit an appreciable broadening of the energetic particle radial density profile at saturation, thus showing an enhanced radial transport w.r.t. the single-n simulations. Moreover, the sub-dominant modes are strongly modified by the nonlinear coupling, which results both from the MHD and from the energetic particle terms. The present nonlinear simulations show that all the toroidal modes saturate almost simultaneously, after inducing an enhanced energetic particle radial transport. No evidence of the so-called "domino" effect is observed.
Two types of kink modes, fishbone and long-lived mode are experimentally and numerically studied at EAST tokamak. In high β_{P} plasma, sawtooth instability was replaced by a saturated 1/1 internal kink mode which either manifests itself as a periodical burst energetic ion related fishbone or as a long-lived mode which is associated to the core safety factor at q_0~1. The present of those 1/1 internal modes are beneficial to the sustain of hybrid scenario with extended regions of low-magnetic shear profile and q_0~1, because of that they can expel high-Z impurity and can make flux pumping. The mechanism responsible for the flux pumping caused by kink mode was numerically in nonlinear 3 D magnetohydrodynamic simulations using the M3D code. Furthermore, M3D+K code hybrid simulation shows a good agreement to the fishbone activity in EAST.
A. The mission of the spherical tokamak NSTX-U is to explore the physics that drives core and pedestal transport and stability at high-β and low collisionality, as part of the development of the ST concept towards a compact, low-cost ST-based Pilot Plant. NSTX-U will operate at up to 2 MA and 1 T with up to 10 MW of Neutral Beam Injection (NBI) power for 5 seconds with up to 4 MW of High Harmonic Fast Wave (HHFW) power. In this parameter space, electromagnetic instabilities are expected to dominate transport. Furthermore, beam-heated NSTX-U plasmas will be able to explore the energetic particle (EP) phase space that is relevant for both α-heated conventional and low aspect ratio burning plasmas. A further objective is to develop the physics understanding and control tools to ramp-up and sustain high performance plasmas in a fully-noninductive fashion for pulse lengths up to 5 s. NSTX-U began research operations in 2016, producing 10 weeks of commissioning and scientific results. However, a number of technical issues, including the failure of a key divertor magnetic field coil, resulted in the suspension of operations and initiation of Recovery activities. During the Recovery outage, there has been considerable work in the area of analysis, theory and modeling with a goal of understanding the underlying physics to develop predictive models that can be used for high-confidence projections for both ST and higher aspect ratio regimes. The studies have addressed issues in thermal plasma transport, indicating the importance of non-local and multi-scale effects, EP-driven instabilities at ion-cyclotron frequencies and below, studying the wave-particle interactions and development of descriptive predictive models, and heat flux width modeling and the role of turbulence broadening. NSTX-U is expected to resume operations during CY2020.
This work was supported by US Department of Energy Contract No. DE-AC02-09CH11466
B. MAST Upgrade will operate in 2018 with unique capabilities to explore plasma exhaust and alternative divertor configurations to address this key issue for DEMO. Modelling of the interaction between filaments with BOUT++ indicates filaments separated by more than 5x their width move independently, and their velocity is slightly perturbed by if their separation is 1 width, suggesting radial density profiles can be modelled as the superposition of filaments. Secondary filaments on MAST are found up to 1ms after type-I ELMs that correlate with plasma interaction with surfaces near the X-point. A quiescent region devoid of filaments near the X-point has been routinely observed, extending from the separatrix to a normalised flux of 1.02. Counter-streaming flows of doubly ionised carbon along field lines, generated by localised gas puffing, have been observed and reproduced in EMC3-EIRENE simulations. MAST-U will be an excellent facility for understanding detachment onset and control in closed divertors. SOLPS modelling predicts the upstream density needed to reach detachment will be over 2x lower in the Super-X configuration compared with the conventional divertor due to increased total magnetic flux expansion. Analytic modelling predicts detachment control in a Super-X is more amenable to external control. Detailed measurements of transport through the edge have been made in MAST L-mode plasmas to characterise a Geodesic Acoustic Mode 2cm from the separatrix. Interpretation of plasma potential profile measurements using ball-pen probes have been improved through kinetic modelling, showing that electrons polarise the material around the probe, leading to ExB drifts of ions to the probe.
Measurements of the effects of sawteeth on fast ion confinement on MAST indicate that passing and trapped particles are equally redistributed by the sawtooth crash. There is no apparent energy threshold for redistribution, indicating redistribution due to a mechanism resonant with the m=1 perturbation. Gyrokinetic simulations of ETG turbulence in MAST are in close agreement with the measured collisionality dependence of the energy confinement time. Beam emission spectroscopy measurements show that flow shear leads to eddy tilting in up-down symmetric plasmas and skewed density fluctuations. First results from MAST Upgrade operations will be presented.
MAST Upgrade will operate in 2018 with unique capabilities to explore plasma exhaust and alternative divertor configurations to address this key issue for DEMO.
Modelling of the interaction between filaments with BOUT++ indicates filaments separated by more than 5x their width move independently, and their velocity is slightly perturbed by if their separation is 1 width, suggesting radial density profiles can be modelled as the superposition of filaments. Secondary filaments on MAST are found up to 1ms after type-I ELMs that correlate with plasma interaction with surfaces near the X-point. A quiescent region devoid of filaments near the X-point has been routinely observed, extending from the separatrix to a normalised flux of 1.02. Counter-streaming flows of doubly ionised carbon along field lines, generated by localised gas puffing, have been observed and reproduced in EMC3-EIRENE simulations. MAST-U will be an excellent facility for understanding detachment onset and control in closed divertors. SOLPS modelling predicts the upstream density needed to reach detachment will be over 2x lower in the Super-X configuration compared with the conventional divertor due to increased total magnetic flux expansion. Analytic modelling predicts detachment control in a Super-X is more amenable to external control.
Detailed measurements of transport through the edge have been made in MAST L-mode plasmas to characterise a Geodesic Acoustic Mode 2cm from the separatrix. Interpretation of plasma potential profile measurements using ball-pen probes have been improved through kinetic modelling, showing that electrons polarise the material around the probe, leading to ExB drifts of ions to the probe.
Measurements of the effects of sawteeth on fast ion confinement on MAST indicate that passing and trapped particles are equally redistributed by the sawtooth crash. There is no apparent energy threshold for redistribution, indicating redistribution due to a mechanism resonant with the m=1 perturbation.
Gyrokinetic simulations of ETG turbulence in MAST are in close agreement with the measured collisionality dependence of the energy confinement time. Beam emission spectroscopy measurements show that flow shear leads to eddy tilting in up-down symmetric plasmas and skewed density fluctuations. First results from MAST Upgrade operations will be presented.
Here we report a novel design of a heating laser for the fast ignition, combining fundamental and second harmonics lights. Such a two-colors laser is expected to heat a dense core more efficiently than a laser only with a fundamental light. We chose a LBO (LiB3O5) crystal which can convert a focusing beam due to its large acceptance of phase matching angle. We experimentally demonstrated the second harmonic conversion with efficiency of 60% at the maximum. The LBO crystal shows a high damage threshold more than 5 J/cm2 with a down-scale LFEX beams. A full size (10 cm×10 cm×2 mm) LBO crystal was manufactured completely and is ready to install for the full-scale LFEX operation.
The baseline approach to high gain ICF involves the implosion of capsules containing a layer of DT ice [1]. DT ice layer designs require a high convergence ratio (CR > 30) implosion, with a hot spot that is dynamically created from DT mass originally residing in a thin layer at the inner DT ice surface. Although high CR is desirable in an idealized 1D sense, it amplifies the deleterious effects of realistic features and asymmetries [2]. An alternative ICF concept uses DT liquid layers [3]. DT liquid layers allow for much higher vapor densities than are possible with DT ice layers. The wide range of vapor densities that are possible with DT liquid layers provides flexibility in hot-spot CR (12 < CR < 25), which, in turn, will provide a reduced sensitivity to asymmetries and instability growth. Given enough vapor mass, the hot spot can be formed from the mass originally residing in the central vapor region. Recent experiments at the National Ignition Facility (NIF) have demonstrated cryogenic liquid DT layer ICF implosions, along with the associated flexibility in the hot spot CR [4,5].
There are tradeoffs involved in high CR ice layer and reduced CR liquid layer designs. With reduced CR, hot spot formation is expected to have improved robustness to instabilities and asymmetries [2-5]. In addition, the hot spot pressure (Pr) required for self-heating is reduced if the hot spot radius (Rhs) is increased (Pr α Rhs^-1). With a reduction in the hot spot Pr requirement, the implosion velocity and fuel adiabat requirements are relaxed. On the other hand, with larger hot spot size, the hot spot energy requirement for self-heating (Ehs) is increased (Ehs α Rhs^2), and the required capsule absorbed energy is increased. In this presentation, we will summarize the recent liquid layer experiments at the NIF and will discuss the hot spot energy, hot spot pressure, cold fuel adiabat, and capsule-absorbed energy requirements for achieving self-heating and propagating burn using liquid layer capsules with hot spot CR<20.
References
[1] S. W. Haan et al., Phys. Plasmas 18, 051001 (2011).
[2] B. M. Haines et al., Phys. Plasmas 24, 072709 (2017).
[3] R. E. Olson and R. J. Leeper, Phys. Plasmas 20, 092705 (2013).
[4] R. E. Olson et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 117, 245001 (2016).
[5] A. B. Zylstra el al., Phys. Plasmas, to be published (2018).
Different Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) First Wall (FW) protections have been proposed in diverse conceptual designs that lead to very different irradiation conditions and macroscopic effects. A review is needed to understand their behavior. Some years ago a European proposal projected the possibility of non-protective FWs considering W and nano-tungsten. This work is describing in detail the behavior of a W and nano-tungsten first wall under pulsed irradiation conditions predicted for the different operational scenarios of that laser fusion project by using advanced engineering modeling tools. Starting with the calculations of the time-dependent pulsed radiation fluxes, assuming 3D geometrical configurations, we estimate the irradiation-induced evolution of first wall temperature as well as, the thermo-mechanical response of the material. Finally, we carry out crack propagation calculations. Results allow us to define operational windows and to identify the main limitations for operation. The atomistic effects of irradiation in the FW are the other key magnitude to determine available lifetime. The role of grain boundaries on the radiation-induced damage and light species behavior is studied both experimentally and computationally, also under pulsed conditions. Important differences are observed in the density of vacancies between nanostructured and coarse-grained samples as well as the preferential places for H accumulation concluding with the influence of temperature.
Optics damage is a great concern in IFE; a new full conceptual final focusing system based on silica transmission lenses for dry wall chambers was designed assuming pulsed conditions based on a temperature control system by using a heat transfer fluid. Optical response of composite materials containing metal nanoparticles was investigated and optimized. Highly concentrated silver colloidal nanoparticle solutions were produced thanks to fs laser ablation and it was demonstrated that such embedded plasmonic nanoparticles may be viable candidates to reduce damages produced on optics by swift heavy ions due to the change of their shape under irradiation.
An advanced molten salt (AMS), in which powders of hydrogen-soluble and chemically reactive metals such as titanium are mixed, is investigated as a potential self-cooled breeding blanket material. It is shown that hydrogen isotope uptake in a vanadium plate in molten salt FLiNaK is suppressed by the addition of Ti powders into the salt. In addition, the corrosion of candidate structural materials in FLiNaK with HF is also suppressed by the addition of titanium powders. Considering these result, tritium formed in the molten salt in fusion blanket will be trapped by the Ti powders, not being trapped by the structure materials (vanadium alloy) and not corroding the structure materials. Neutronics and tritium mass balance calculations are also performed and it is showed that FLiNaK based Be-free blanket is feasible.
The Linear IFMIF Prototype Accelerator aims to operate in Rokkasho Fusion Institute a 125 mA/cw deuteron beam at 9 MeV In order to prove the technical feasibility of the IFMIF accelerators concept.
A 2.45 GHz ECR ion source developed by CEA-Saclay is designed to deliver 140 mA/100 keV CW D + beam. The low energy beam transfer line (LEBT) relies on a dual solenoid focusing system to transport and match the beam into the next accelerating section which is a Radio-Frequency Quadrupole (RFQ). At the end of the LEBT, the normalized RMS emittance has to be lower than 0.3$\pi$ mm.mrad in order to reach the optimal beam transmission through the RFQ.
This contribution will present the different commissioning phases of LIPAC ion source and LEBT. The experimental results that have been obtained will be reported. In particular, beam emittance measurements as a function of ion source extraction voltage gaps, total extracted current from the source and solenoid tunings will be showed.
In order to model as well as possible the beam transport thought LEBT, intensive beam dynamics simulations that take into account space charge compensation have been performed using a self-consistent particle-in-cell code. Simulation results will be discussed and compared to experimental data.
In the presently available fusion reactors, cryogenic helium is an integral part for cooling the magnets in order to achieve super conductivity. Some of the fusion reactors use tritium as a nuclear fuel along with deuterium, in which a part of tritium is proposed to be breeded through lithium blanket covering the first wall of plasma. Since fusion reactors have very small burn up efficiencies (~ 0.3 to 2 % only), a very small amount of fuel is consumed and majority of the unburnt fuel is required to be pumped out and is reprocessed for subsequent cycles. Due to the magnetic and neutronic environment prevailing inside the fusion reactor, for the evacuation of the vacuum vessel, cryo-pumps are the suitable choice as compared to other available options. Cryo-pumps provide cooled surface of charcoal as an adsorber bed to trap the gaseous molecules. The adsorber beds are cooled down to 5K with the help of cryogenic liquid helium being supplied from the cryo-plant with an intermediate cold box in order to provide better controllability. The contamination of cryogenic helium with tritium arises in the cryo-pumps and may be extended to the cryo-plant. Thus are possible scenarios where the hand-shaking of tritium with cryogenic helium is possible thereby posing a threat to cryogenic plant safety depending on the extent of tritium contamination of cryogenic fluid and hence is required to be analyzed while designing the system. The tritium impact on cryo-plant design in the presently available tokamaks (such as ITER, etc.) has not been taken into consideration in the design as the amount of tritium permeated through stainless steel to cryogenic helium, through cryo-pumps, is not substantial. But for future fusion reactors where the amount of tritium to be handled would be substantial, the threat can’t be evaded. This leads to open a new area of research in the context of design of cryo-plants for future fusion reactors.
The present study throws light on the possible scenario and mechanism of tritium diffusion along with the extent of contamination and its validation through available experimental data. This study will also be helpful for design of the cryo-plants for future fusion commercial reactors.
The UK Government has invested ~€100M to create two new UKAEA centres for fusion research –
Hydrogen-3 Advanced Technology (H3AT) and the Fusion Technology Facilities (FTF) both opening in
2020-21. FTF and H3AT will foster close cooperation with industry, academia and other international
laboratories to develop and transfer knowledge between partners, offering opportunities to
undertake R&D; to reduce risk for ITER and to make significant contributions to the EU DEMO and
international fusion programmes.
The FTF offers a complete development life cycle for materials and components in three facilities.
The Materials Technology Laboratory develops and qualifies materials using small sample testing
techniques to reduce costs and offer in-service testing. The Joining and Advanced Manufacturing
Laboratory specialises in material joining and manufacturing technologies for fusion including
additive manufacture and laser welding. It has a dedicated small sample test facility, HIVE, capable
of providing up to 20MWm-2 over 20x20mm. The Module Test Facility provides fusion relevant
testing environments, with heat flux up to 2MWm-2 (and higher localised flux) and DEMO relevant
water cooling loop for metre-scale components.
H3ATprovides space for active and inactive experiments with Tritium grade ventilation and glove
boxes complete with pressure control and purging systems offer user-ready specialist facilities for a
range of R&D; activities. In addition to providing a supply of Tritium, H3AT offers a flexible gas mixing
capability, removing the need for gas mixture preparation for experiments. A flexible gas analytical
system is networked to the experimental stations that are also served with vacuum systems, Tritium
recovery and de-tritiation facilities.
This paper will describe the new facilities in terms of their technical capabilities and the progress to
their realisation.
In high microwave power applications like gyrotron, transmission line system, calorimetric dummy load, etc, requires design, modeling, simulation and evaluation of transmission line system before fabrication of the same is undertaken. Under the aegis of Department of Science and Technology (DST), a multi-institutional program for the development of a gyrotron operating at 42±0.2GHz/200kW/3secs in TE03 mode has been undertaken. It is currently in an advance stage of test and commissioning at IPR (Institute for Plasma Research). It is desired for plasma applications that the output mode of gyrotron in TE03 mode is to be converted to HE11 mode for efficient coupling to plasma. The HE11 mode (TEM00 mode), has an electric field distribution very close to that of an ideal Gaussian mode. This gaussian like mode is preferred for high-power transmission through overmoded corrugated waveguides, which gives insertion loss lower than that of any other modes. The proposed design of transmission line system converts unpolarized TE03 mode into polarized HE11 mode.
The ripples walled mode converters are designed for converting TE03 to TE01 in two steps. TE01 mode is converted to TM11 by bending a smooth waveguide at an angle of 34.94°. Finally TM11 mode is converted to HE11 mode. Miter bend for TE01 mode and HE11 mode are also designed. The designed corrugated waveguide operates at 42±0.2GHz. The Final design of all the components are verified using simulation studies carried out in CST-MWS. Performance optimization has been carried out prior to fabrication process. At this point in time, fabrication of many of the mode converters has been completed and miter bends are under mechanical fabrication process. As a part of a design, transmission line system is mechanically compatible to high vacuum and 1bar pressurization.
The system includes two design approaches whose performances are compared in terms of insertion loss, bandwidth and cost effective manufacturing. Both the proposed design approaches of transmission line system have total insertion loss of 1.3 to 1.5dB. The bandwidth of first design approach is wider as compared to second. Flexibility of manufacturing process of transmission line system is an advantage of second approach. The Salient point of design and simulation studies of transmission line system are discussed and highlighted in the manuscript.
Controlling the tearing mode (TM) is one of the major topics of fusion research, since TM degrades the plasma confinement and even induces major disruption if it is locked. Previous experimental and theoretical studies showed that the resonant magnetic perturbations (RMPs) influence both the rotation and width of the TM. As a result, the static RMP could apply a net stabilizing and braking effect on a rotating TM, and hence suppress or lock the TM. Based on these effects, 3 strategies for controlling the TM have been proposed and tested in J-TEXT by applying the pulsed or fast rotating RMPs. This paper will present these recent efforts.
On J-TEXT, the RMP system is capable of providing either a static or a high frequency (up to 6 kHz) rotating RMP field, with dominant 2/1 component. To study the proposed TM control methods, extensive upgrades of the power supply (PS) system for RMP coils were carried out, such as building a pulsed DC PS which could follow the TM frequency with 50% duty cycle, a hopping frequency AC PS, an on-line system for measuring the TM phase and frequency.
The first control strategy is to apply pulsed RMP to the TM only during the accelerating phase region. By nonlinear numerical modelling, it is proved efficient in accelerating the mode rotation and even completely suppresses the mode. The followed experimental attempt with the pulsed RMP at relative low amplitude has demonstrated the acceleration effect. The second control method is to apply a RMP, rotating with varying frequency which is kept slightly higher than that of a TM. Currently, the open loop application of this hopping PS led to the locking of TM at 4, 5 and 6 kHz successively. Further investigation with feedback controlled hopping PS is needed to validate this method.
Thirdly, the fast rotating RMP field has been successfully applied for the avoidance of mode locking and the prevention of plasma disruption. A set of disruptive discharges induced by intrinsic mode locking were performed by reducing the edge safety factor from 3 towards 2. The braking of TM usually lasted for ~20 ms and the disruption followed at ~10 ms after the mode locked. Trigged by the mode locking warning system, the 3 kHz rotating RMP was applied before the mode locked. The TM was accelerated to 3 kHz and the intrinsic mode locking was avoided. As a result, the disruption was prevented.
ITER cooling waters system consists of large piping network to remove the heat load of about 950MWatt through various branched connections. Many of the branches are connected to main pipes by half coupling full penetration weld joints. There is requirement is to have full penetration for all the joints however quality classification (QC-2), recommends only 10% testing of the total weldment. In view of this it is expected that there can be some joints with little or no penetration.. The above requirement demands for the structural strength and fatigue life is assessment to ascertain that components is not failing even if there is no weld penetration. The design by analysis approach is considered for structural and fatigue life assessment, for maximum expected loads combination case. The weld joint is structurally qualified using ASME code. Fatigue life of weld joint is calculated using both ASME Section VIII Div.2 and RCC-MR RR3261.12. The maximum stress and fatigue life observed for full penetration is 92 MPa and 315766 cycles as per ASME and 200000 cycles as per RCC-MR. Whereas, in no penetration the stress is 188 MPa and fatigue life is 137210 cycles as per ASME and 1500 cycles as per RCC-MR. It is concluded in the paper that weld joint is safe for both the case in most severe load case combination.
References:
• P. Dong, J. K. Hong, “The Master S-N Curve Approach To Fatigue Of Piping And Vessel Welds”, Welding in the World January 2004, Volume 48, Issue 1, pp 28–36,
• ASME Sec VIII Div 2
• RCC-MR RR3261.12
• Ansys Theory of Reference
Lead-Lithium (Pb-Li) alloy in its eutectic composition is one of the promising candidates to be used as liquid blanket in fusion reactor. Helium cooled Lead Lithium (EU-HCLL), Dual cooled Lead Lithium (US-HCLL), Indian LLCB are some of the concepts being explored worldwide for future fusion reactor [1]. In this scenario, the characterization of Pb-Li alloy becomes important to gainfully understand its underlying physical/structural behavior. In the present paper, we report the results of our computer experiments on structural and vibrational properties of Pb-Li. Present work is performed using plane wave pseudopotential density functional theory within generalized gradient approximation (GGA). Calculations of various structural properties at ambient condition (T, P = 0) are performed using Quantum ESPRESSO package. Further, phonon frequencies along major symmetry directions are also calculated using density functional perturbation theory. Three independent elastic constants are also calculated for both the compensating structures namely Rhombohedral and CsCl type. Calculations of equation of state at elevated temperatures suggest that Pb-Li is a soft material undergoing large volume change with pressure. Further, some thermodynamic properties at elevated temperatures are also reported.
The research goals are determining the effect of nitrogen plasma on the tungsten and comparative analysis of the formation of tungsten fuzz on the helium plasma interaction on the initial surface of tungsten and on the surface of tungsten, previously subjected to nitriding. The experiments were carried out on an imitation stand with a plasma-beam installation. The device provides the following parameters of the plasma flow: the diameter of the plasma flow in front of the target up to 30 mm; the intensity of the magnetic field produced on the axis of the plasma-beam discharge chamber is 0.1 T; the plasma density in the beam is up to 10^18 m^-3; the maximum current in the plasma is 1 A; the electron temperature range of the plasma is 5 15 eV.
All stages of the experiments contained studies of the surface of tungsten using optical and SE microscopy, elemental and X-ray analysis, and determination of the hardness of the surface of tungsten samples.
As a result of the series of experiments on nitridation of tungsten, an optimal nitriding regime was determined that lead to the formation of tungsten nitrides on the surface of the irradiated sample. A series of irradiation experiments were realized on the initial tungsten surface with helium plasma in the plasma-beam discharge regime. On the surface of the samples, a coating was found tungsten fuzz. Experiments have been carried out on the irradiation of tungsten with a helium plasma with a previously nitrided surface. The results of the investigations showed that tungsten fuzz forms on the nitrided surface of tungsten, as well as on the initial surface. On the initial surface of tungsten, the structure of the fuzz is more uniform than on nitrided samples.
Sum up, the conducted experiments showed that nitridation of the tungsten surface does not play an important role in the formation of the tungsten nanostructure as a result of irradiation of tungsten with helium plasma.
A series of experiments has been conducted at AUG and TCV to disentangle the role of fueling, plasma triangularity and closeness to a double null (DN) configuration for the onset of the small ELM regime. At AUG, the role of the SOL density has been revisited. Indeed, it turns out that a large density SOL is not a sufficient condition to achieve the type-II (small) ELM regime. This has been demonstrated with a constant gas fueled plasma close to DN which has been progressively shifted down, relaxing therefore the closeness to DN at constant. As the plasma is moved down, Type-I ELMs are progressively restored, finally being the unique ELM regime. It is observed that not only the pedestal top profiles are unchanged, but also the SOL profiles remained unaffected by transition from Type-II to Type-I ELMs. We conclude that the separatrix density is not the unique key parameter and it is hypothesized that the local magnetic shear, modified by the closeness to DN, could play an important role. A small ELM regime with good confinement has been achieved at TCV, a full carbon machine featuring an open divertor. A systematic scan in the fueling rate has been done for both medium and high triangularity shapes. For the latter case, a configuration close to a DN configuration, the stored energy and the pedestal top pressure increase by 5% and 30% respectively compared to the medium triangularity case. For both shapes, as the D2 fueling is increased, the Type-I ELM frequency decreases and small ELMs are observed in between large ones. Finally for the high triangularity, at the maximum fueling rate, the large ELMs are fully suppressed and only the small ELMs remain. As observed in JET and AUG, the pedestal pressure degrades with increasing fueling, up to 40% for the high triangularity scenario, although the stored energy remains almost unchanged. It is also observed that, for both shapes, the density at the separatrix increases with the fueling rate, reaching $n_{e,sep}/n_G$ ~0.3 at $n_{e,av}/n_G$~0.75. The small ELM regime at TCV is associated with a coherent mode at about 30 kHz seen by the magnetic probes located at the outboard midplane. The outer target heat loads from IR tomography are reduced by more than a factor of 5 when transiting towards the small ELM regime.
The divertor properties of a two nearby magnetic poloidal nulls (2-NDN) configuration have been recently investigated in steady state (Vloop<0) H-mode plasmas, (H98=1), Edge Localized Modes (ELM) absent, on EAST tokamak. Due to the location of Poloidal Field (PF) coils and target plates in EAST, the secondary null could be moved around from the primary one to form a magnetic configuration that features either a contracting or flaring geometry near the plate. An increase of the connection length by ~30% and flux expansion in the outer strike point (SP) region by a factor of ~3 with respect the single null (SN) case, in all the upper 2-NDN discharges have been achieved. A reduction of peak heat loads, of the same order of flux expansion increase, on the upper full W divertor targets, both in L-mode and H-mode discharges, has been observed consistently with theory predictions and predictive 2D edge simulations. In all the 2-NDN steady-state discharge the ELMs activity was quiescent, indicating a possible non-linear interaction between the downstream magnetic topology and the upstream kinetic gradients. Another potential explanation of the quiescent ELMs could be linked with the role of electrostatic edge coherent mode (ECM) which resides in the pedestal region and whom topological structure could be affected by variation of the local connection length. The ECM contribution to ELMs behavior on 2-NDN scenario is presently under investigation.
DIII-D experiments have demonstrated the expansion of the high-betaN hybrid scenario to the high density levels necessary for radiating divertor operation, leading to pedestal enhancement, and showed how the choice of injected impurity impacts the effectiveness of a radiating mantle solution, as well as the impurity transport to the core and the divertor. The scenario was made robust to systematic changes in EC power deposition location and current drive magnitude or heating injection, and was extended to zero beam torque, where the plasmas are passively stable with and without EC power. Coupling a high-performance core to an acceptable heat flux divertor is a crucial step for ITER and any fusion reactor. This work presents results on all the necessary ingredients, implemented in the high betaN hybrid scenario: high density, on- and off-axis electron heating and current drive, pedestal enhancement, puff-and-pump and radiating mantle techniques and impurity transport. 2017 experiments confirmed ELITE simulations which predicted that a near double null configuration and reactor-relevant q_95>5.5 are required for the pedestal enhancement with density. The impact of impurities used for the radiating mantle on the core of the plasmas, as well as their transport in the edge and divertor will be discussed.
The ITER Pre-Fusion Power Operating (PFPO) phase will include half-field/half-current (2.65T, 7.5 MA) and one-third field (1.8T, 5MA) operating scenarios, which ought to allow H-mode access even with limited heating [1].
While PFPO-1 relies only on ECRH and ICRH to achieve the H-mode, in PFPO-2 also the neutral beams will be applied. In the PFPO phases, the plasma will consist of either hydrogen or helium, and will operate at about half of the Greenwald density. Beam operation at low densities requires lower acceleration voltages due to shine-through constraints, so that the maximum beam energy in PFPO is limited to below 870 keV for He plasma.
The goal of this contribution is to determine power loads, due to both charged and neutral particles, to the ITER first wall from neutral beam heating in both the one-third and half-field scenarios, as well as determine the over-all beam performance (heating, current-drive and torque to the plasma) using the full beam capabilities envisaged for both scenarios. The ASCOT suite of codes was used for this purpose since it allows including the effect of ferritic inserts which, due to the lowered field values, can not work in the manner they were designed for. Since the pre-fusion phase will also serve as a relatively benign environment for testing various ITER subsystems, notably ELM mitigation methods, we shall also address the effect of ELM Control Coils (ECC) on fast ion containment.
In the absence of the ECC’s, the beam ions are found to be very well confined. For instance, in the half-field scenario, using the full beam power of 33 MW, power losses are less than 0.1%, with peak power of 130 kW/m2. Shine-through, on the other, is non-negligible: even in the flat-top phase of the discharge the shine-through was 1.8% of the 870 keV beam power, with a corresponding peak power of 680kW/m2. Additional simulations were carried out to determine the electron density resulting in a peak power load of less than 1MW/m2. By varying electron density while keeping the plasma quasineutral and the plasma composition constant, the critical density was found to be approximately 4·1019m-3.
[1] M Schneider et al., ‘Modelling of third field operation in the ITER pre-fusion power operation phase’, in this conference
H-11B Fusion Reactor with Extreme Laser Pulses for non-LTE Igniton
Heinrich Hora
Department of Theoretical Physics, University of New South Wales, Sydney/Australia
h.hora@unsw.edu.au
The progress for the design of a reactor for laser boron fusion is following a road map [1] based on the use of extreme deviations from local thermal equilibrium LTE conditions by using just available picosecond laser pulses of more than petawatt PW power. Fusion of hydrogen H with the boron isotope 11 (HB11 fusion) at LTE is extremely difficult. For spherical compression with lasers, densities 100,000 times of the solid state and temperatures above 100 keV are necessary, such that the energy gains are about five orders of magnitudes below the usual DT fusion. The necessary non-LTE ignition condition is possible if the equation of motion is determined by the electric and magnetic fields E and H of the laser such that the gas dynamic pressure is only a small perturbation. The nonlinear (ponderomotive) force calculations of 1978 [2] resulted in ultrahigh accelerations, measured by Sauerbrey [3] as predicted. With the present ps extreme laser pulses, the measured [4] nine orders of magnitudes higher energy gains from HB11 can be explained with inclusion of the avalanche reaction due to the generated three 3 MeV alphas at each reaction [5]. Combining these results with the kilotesla magnetic fields [6] for cylindrical trapping of the reaction in solid density HB11 fuel ignited end-on by the petawatt laser pulse, shows how 14 milligram of boron produces 300 kWh energy in nearly equal energetic 3 MeV alphas. The reported steps for the design of the reactor follows the parameters [1] for energy genertion with no problems of nuclear radiation producing low cost electricity.
[1] Hora H., Eliezer S. Kirchhoff G.J, Nissim N., Wang J.X., Lalousis, P., Xu Y.X., Miley, G.H., Martinez-Val J.-M., McKenzie W., and Kirchhoff, J. 2017 Laser and Particle Beams 35, 730
[2] Hora H., 1981 Physics of Laser Driven Plasmas Wiley New York
[3] Sauerbrey R., 1996 Physics of Plasmas 3, 4712
[4] Picciotto A., Margarone D. et al. 2014 Physical Review X4, 031030
[5] Eliezer S., Hora H., Korn G. et al. 2016 Physics of Plasmas 23, 050704
[6] Fujioka, S. et al. 2013 Nat. Sci. Rep. 3, 1170
R. Manchanda1, M. B. Chowdhuri1, Nandini Yadava2, J. Ghosh1, 3, S. Banerjee1, Nilam Nimavat, K. Tahiliani, M. V. Gopalakrishna, U. C. Nagora1, P. K. Atrey1, J. Raval1, Y. S. Joisa1,
K. A. Jadeja1, R. L. Tanna1, and Aditya team
1Institute for Plasma Research, Bhat, Gandhinagar 382 428, India
2Gujarat University, Navrangpura, Ahmedabad 380 009, India
3Homi Bhabha National Institute, Mumbai, 400094, India
E-mail : rmanchanda@ipr.res.in
Abstract
Impurity behaviour has been studied for the high density Aditya tokamak plasmas. These discharges were operated with higher toroidal magnetic fields and thereby it sustained higher plasma current. Higher densities were achieved with the help of multiple gas puffs. High energy confinement times, sometimes higher than the values predicated by Neo-Alcator scaling for Ohmically heated tokamak plasma were achieved for these discharges [1]. In Aditya tokamak, visible and VUV spectroscopy have been extensively used to study the impurity behaviour. The neutral hydrogen and impurity emissions were routinely monitored by optical fiber, interference filter and PMT based system in the visible range. The spectral line emissions from higher ionized charge state of impurities, such as C4+, and O5+, were recorded by a VUV survey spectrometer operated in the 10 - 180 nm. This wavelength range covers the important lines of partially ionized low and medium Z impurities, as for example iron and also emissions from higher excited states of highly ionized low Z impurities, like carbon and oxygen. It has been found that H, OII, and CIII emissions normalized with density (ne), and visible continuum normalized with ne2 show a gradual decrease with increase in density indicating lower impurity concentration in the high density discharges. This is also corroborated by the observed reduction in radiation power losses with increase in ne. These results clearly suggest the achievement of improved confinement for Aditya plasma and are correlated with obtained higher energy confinement times in those discharges. In this presentation, details studies on impurity behaviour for its role into the improved plasma properties in these high densities plasma discharges will be discussed.
[1] R. L. Tanna, J. Ghosh et al, Nucl. Fusion 57 (2017) 102008
Future inertial fusion reactors are supposed to work with long pulses or with high repetition rates using repeated pellet implosions. In such extreme environments, the reactor wall materials will be disclosed to short X-ray pulses and fusion generated fragments. This will cause ablation to the wall material in the form of plasma that is expected to collide with each other in the center of the chamber or interpenetrate to elsewhere within the reactor chamber. In this work, a laboratory experimental setup; is devoted to use colliding plasmas scheme to investigate the collision effects similar to plasma facing components in fusion reactors.
Different materials were used for these collapsing plasma experiments for controlling the velocity of plasma plumes. A special experimental setup was built where the laser is focused into a line-like shape impinged as two perpendicular beams onto a semi-circular target. The setup was carefully built to force the seed plasmas to collapse in the center of the chamber prior to the colliding process. The interpenetration and stagnation layer, if exists, of plasmas of candidate fusion wall materials, viz., carbon and tungsten, and other materials, viz., aluminum, and molybdenum were investigated in this study. While tungsten plumes interpenetrate each other at the colliding interface, carbon colliding plumes formed a strong stagnation layer, which could be a source of nanoparticles and plasma aerosols generation that may hinder fusion high repletion rates.
The evolution of the JET high performance hybrid scenario, including central accumulation of the tungsten (W) impurity, is reproduced with predictive multi-channel integrated modelling over multiple confinement times using first-principle based models. 8 transport channels ($T_i,T_e,n_D,n_{Be},n_{Ni},v_{tor},j$) are modelled predictively with self-consistent predictions for sources, radiation, and magnetic equilibrium, yielding a predictive system with multiple nonlinearities which can reproduce observed radiative temperature collapse after several confinement times. The mechanism responsible for W accumulation is inward neoclassical convection driven by the main ion density gradients and enhanced by poloidal asymmetries due to centrifugal acceleration. The slow timescale of bulk density evolution sets the timescale for central W accumulation. Prediction of this phenomenon requires a turbulent transport model capable of accurately predicting particle and momentum transport (QuaLiKiz) and a neoclassical transport model including the effects of poloidal asymmetries (NEO) coupled to an integrated plasma simulator (JINTRAC). The modelling capability is applied to optimise the available actuators to prevent W accumulation, and to extrapolate in power and pulse length. Central NBI heating is preferred for high performance, but comes at the price of central deposition of particles and torque which pose the risk of W accumulation. Several benefits of ICRH to mitigate W accumulation are examined: The primary mechanism for ICRH to control W in JET are via its impact on the bulk profiles and turbulent diffusion, which are insensitive to details of the ICRH scheme. High power density near the axis is found to be best to maximise the beneficial effects of ICRH against W, but changing the minority species or its concentration does not significantly change the W behavior. With attention to the location of the ICRH resonance and MHD stability, high performance hybrid scenario discharges of 5s at maximum power should be possible in the coming campaign, and a controlled and steady fusion performance in the subsequent JET DT campaign. This work demonstrates the integration of multiple first-principle models into a powerful multi-channel predictive tool for the core plasma, able to guide JET scenario development to its objectives of higher performance and longer pulses.
Advanced tokamak scenario with central q close to 1 has been achieved on HL-2A tokamak. An ITB has been observed during the nonlinear evolution of a saturated long-lived internal mode (LLM) or fishbone activities in HL-2A discharges as the q-profile formed a very broad low-shear region with qmin ~ 1. Such steep ion temperature-gradient zone locates around r/a=0.5-0.6 with Ti>Te. The observed normalized ion temperature gradient (R/LTi) is of 10.6, which exceeded the value for a level without ITB of∼6.5. Here, R is the major radius and LTi is the scale length of the Ti gradient defined by LTi= aTi/(dTi/dρ). When the barrier forms, the turbulence is significantly reduced around ITB foot(r/a=0.6), as measured by reflectometry in figure 2. The simultaneous excitation of the ITB and the bursting internal mode can only occur if the q-profile in the core remains flat in the plasma central region. This confirms the role played by the central internal kink instabilities in the production of ITBs in reversed or weak shear plasmas.
It was found that the q min reaching an integer value (q =1) throughout the ITB period, and there is a correlation between the emergence of the ITB formation and the evolution of central magnetic shear due to the perturbation of m=1/n=1 LLM or fishbone activity. A possible explanation for the LLM or fishbone being able to trigger or sustain ITBs is that the interaction between MHD instabilities and fast ion leads to a redistribution of the resonant fast ion. Based on this assumption, dedicated experiment have attempted to reproduce the stationary advanced scenario with q0 close to 1 by applying extra ECRH for enhancement of the fishbone activities. With strong fishbone activities enhanced by application of ECRH, this scenario does exhibit a clear prolonged ITB during the stationary phase of the discharge, extending the domain of existence of ITB form 10 confinement times to 20 confinement times, and the confinement enhancement factors over ITER89P L-mode scaling, form HITER89-P=1.7 to a new level of HITER89-P=2.1.
A goal of this research project is to describe the evolution of the electron temperature profiles in high collisionality NSTX H-mode discharges. In these discharges the ion thermal transport is generally near neoclassical levels. However, it is found that the electron thermal transport is anomalous and can limit the overall global energy confinement scaling. Gyrokinetic simulations indicate that microtearing modes (MTMs) are a source of significant electron thermal transport in these discharges. In order to understand the effect MTMs have on transport and, consequently, on the evolution of electron temperature in NSTX discharges, a reduced transport model for MTMs has been developed. The dependence of the MTM real frequency and growth rate on plasma parameters, appropriate for high collisionality NSTX discharges, is obtained employing the new MTM transport model. The dependencies on plasma parameters are compared and found to be consistent with MTM results previously obtained using the gyrokinetic GYRO code. The MTM real frequency, growth rate, magnetic fluctuations and resulting electron thermal transport are examined for high collisionality NSTX discharges in systematic scans over plasma parameters. The electron temperature gradient along with the collision frequency and plasma beta are found to be sufficient for the microtearing modes to become unstable. In earlier studies it was found that the version of the Multi-Mode (MM) transport model, that did not include the effect of MTMs, provided a suitable description of the electron temperature profiles in high collisionality standard tokamak discharges. That version of the MM model included contributions to electron thermal transport from the ion temperature gradient, trapped electrons, kinetic ballooning, peeling ballooning, collisionless and collision dominated MHD modes, and electron temperature gradient modes. When the MM model, that includes transport associated with MTMs, is installed in the TRANSP code and is utilized in studying electron thermal transport in high collisionality NSTX discharges, it is found that agreement with the experimental electron temperature profile is significantly improved. Future research will involve improving the electron thermal transport model for low collisionality NSTX discharges. *Supported by the U.S. DoE, DE-SC0013977, DE-FG02-92ER54141, and DE-AC02-09CH11466.
The main characteristic of an endogenous magnetic reconnection process is that its driving factor lays within the layer where a drastic change of magnetic field topology occurs. This kind of process is shown to take place when a significant electron temperature gradient is present in a magnetically confined plasma and when the evolving electron temperature fluctuations are anisotropic [1]. Then [2] two classes of reconnecting modes are identified. The localized class of mode involve a reconnected field ${{\tilde{B}}_{x}}$ of odd parity (as a function of the radial variable), characteristic phase velocities and growth rates differently from the commonly considered reconnecting modes associated with a finite effective resistivity. The width of the reconnection layer remains significant even when large macroscopic distances are considered. In view of the fact that there are plasmas in the Universe with considerable electron thermal energy contents, the features of the considered modes can be relied upon in order to produce generation or conversion of magnetic energy and high energy particle populations through a sequence of mode-particle resonances [3]. With their excitation, these modes acquire momentum in the direction of the main magnetic field component and the main body of the plasma column should recoil in the opposite direction [4].
Endogenous modes associated with a finite electron temperature gradient are shown to be sustained by the electron temperature heating rate due to the charged reaction products in a fusion burning plasma [5]. In this case, the longitudinal thermal conductivity on selected rational magnetic surfaces [5] is decreased, relative to its collisional value, by the effects of reconnection.
The best agreement between theory and experiments concerning the onset of magnetic reconnection is (probably) represented by the theory of the resistive internal kink mode [6]. This is reconsidered for regimes where the effects of local temperature gradients are important. *Supported by the U.S. DOE.
[1] B. Coppi and B. Basu, Phys. Lett. A, 382, 400 (2018).
[2] B. Coppi, Phys. Fluids, 8, 2273 (1965).
[3] B. Coppi, B. Basu, and A. Fletcher, Nucl. Fus., 57, 7 (2017).
[4] B. Coppi, Nucl. Fus., 42, 1 (2002).
[5] B. Coppi, et al., Nucl. Fus., 55, 053011 (2015).
[6] B. Coppi, R. Galvao, R. Pellat, et al., Fiz. Plazmy, 2, 961 (1976).
The interaction of a locked tearing mode with a non-axisymmetric control field is found to be in good qualitative agreement with predictions of a nonlinear resistive MHD model [1]. Locked tearing mode islands often lead to disruptions in tokamaks. However, experiments have shown that unlocking and rotation of the island by a rotating control field (CF) can postpone or prevent a disruption [2]. The dynamics of this control has been modeled with the "AEOLUS-IT" code [1] in both tearing stable and unstable plasmas. In the tearing stable plasma, a static error field (EF) drives the island growth, which is successfully stabilized by the CF. Even in tearing unstable plasmas, the CF is predicted to reduce the nonlinearly saturated island size. Model predictions of two distinct regimes of plasma response, characterized as standing-wave and traveling-wave, are in good qualitative agreement with DIII-D observations. These results are an important step toward predictive understanding of this new approach to tearing mode control and disruption avoidance.
[1] S. Inoue et al., Nucl. Fusion 57, 116020 (2017); Plasma Phys. Control. Fusion 60, 025003 (2018).
[2] M. Okabayashi et al., Nucl. Fusion 57, 016035 (2017).
In HL-2A low rotation and relatively low density plasmas, the critical threshold of the intrinsic error field penetration will be decreasing. And the multi-helicity islands can be seeded by the non-axisymmetric error field penetration, and lead to the change of rotation profile, enhanced transport or even disruption. Sheared flow arising from momentum injection can suppressed the coupled islands. For understanding the experimental results, numerical modelling will be carried out by means of reduced magnetohydrodynamic simulations. The results provide important evidence for NTMs stability predictions and their nonlinear dynamic in the low flow plasmas, such as ITER.
Resonant magnetic perturbations (RMPs) can be used to mitigate or fully suppress the harmful Edge Localized Modes (ELMs). In DIII-D, the ELM suppression is observed to be correlated with the enhanced particle and heat transport near the pedestal top. Initial simulations using Gyrokinetic Toroidal Code (GTC) show that the kink responses to the 3D RMP have little effect on the growth rate of electromagnetic kinetic-ballooning mode and on the turbulent transport and zonal flow damping in electrostatic turbulence [Holod, et. al., Nuclear Fusion 57, 016005 (2017)]. On the other hand, fast RMP modulation experiments in DIII-D tokamak show that the turbulent poloidal velocity changes in phase with the modulated RMP current, suggesting that the RMP may modify the local radial electric field $E_r$.
Here we report from GTC simulations that reduced $E_r \times B$ shearing rate due to the RMP leads to the much stronger driftwave instability in the outer edge and outward turbulence spreading, resulting in a larger turbulent transport on the pedestal top in the DIII-D experiments. Simulation results are consistent with experimental observations of increased turbulence and transport near the pedestal top during RMP-induced ELM suppression. Furthermore, GTC simulations of neoclassical transport show that the electron flutter motion due to the RMP islands introduces a radial particle flux that is not strong enough to directly provide the measured enhancement in the transport, but may contribute to the observed change in the radial electric field. Finally, electrostatic turbulence simulations with adiabatic electrons show no significant increase of the saturated ion heat conductivity in the presence of RMP-induced islands. However, electron response to zonal flow in the presence of magnetic islands and stochastic fields can drastically increase zonal flow dielectric constant for long wavelength fluctuations. Zonal flow generation can then be reduced and the microturbulence can be enhanced greatly.
Edge Localised Modes (ELMs) are thought to be caused by a spectrum of magnetohydrodynamic instabilities, including the ballooning mode. While ballooning modes have been studied extensively both theoretically and experimentally, the focus of the vast majority of this research has been on isotropic plasmas. The prevalence of pressure anisotropy in modern tokamaks thus motivates further study of these modes. This paper presents a numerical analysis of ballooning modes in anisotropic equilibria. The investigation was conducted using the newly-developed codes HELENA+ATF and MISHKA-A, which adds anisotropic physics to equilibria and stability analysis. We have examined the impact of anisotropy on the stability of an n=30 ballooning mode, confirming results conform to previous calculations in the isotropic limit. Growth rates of ballooning modes in equilibria with different levels of anisotropy were then calculated using the stability code MISHKA-A. The key finding is that the level of anisotropy had a significant impact on ballooning mode growth rates. For T⊥ > T||, typical of ICRH heating, the growth rate increases, while for T⊥ < T||, typical of neutral beam heating, the growth rate decreases. For levels of anisotropy observed in JET and MAST plasmas, we expect the impact on growth rates for realistic configurations to be significant. An important conclusion is the possibility that higher ELM-free performance might be achieved by increasing p||/p⊥ in the pedestal region.
It has been thought that asymmetric vertical displacement event (AVDE) disruptions in
ITER might produce large electromechanical forces on the walls and other conducting structures
surrounding the plasma.
It is shown that ITER
AVDE disruptions
should produce a small
asymmetric wall force, comparable to JET. This is demonstrated in simulations [1,2] with the M3D 3D MHD code [3] and confirmed in JET
experiments [4]
in which the current was quenched with massive gas injection (MGI).
In ITER the current quench (CQ) time, tau_{CQ}, is less than or equal to the resistive wall
penetration time, tau_{wall}.
JET is in a different parameter regime, with tau_{CQ} > tau_{wall}.
JET simulations were validated by comparison [1] to JET shot 71985 data and were in good
agreement. The wall time was then artificially increased, keeping tau_{CQ} fixed,
and it was found
that the wall force decreased.
The reduction of the asymmetric wall force was also found in experimental data [4] of
JET MGI mitigated disruption shots.
Further simulations [2] were carried out of ITER AVDEs. The asymmetric wall force was calculated for a wide range of CQ times.
For tau_{CQ} < tau_{wall}, the force was
not much larger than in JET.
A fast CQ may cause production of runaway electrons (REs).
The effect of replacing part of
of the current with REs on MHD behavior will be discussed.
Simulations using a modified
version of M3D with a fluid RE model [5] will be presented.
Acknowledgment: Work supported by USDOE and
Euratom research and training programme
2014-2018 under grant agreement No 633053,
within the EUROfusion Consortium.
Views and opinions herein do not necessarily reflect
those of the European Commission.
[1] H. Strauss, E. Joffrin, V. Riccardo, J. Breslau, R. Paccagnella, Phys. Plasmas 24, 102512 (2017).
[2] H. Strauss, Physics of Plasmas 25, 020702 (2018).
[3] W. Park, E. Belova, G. Y. Fu, et al., Phys. Plasmas 6, 1796 (1999).
[4] S. Jachmich, P. Drewelow, et al., 43rd EPS Conf. Plasma Physics (2016)
[5] Huishan Cai and Guoyong Fu, Nucl. Fusion 55, 022001 (2015).
The injection of boron (B) and boron nitride (BN) powders into ASDEX-Upgrade (AUG) H-mode discharges have shown the ability to effectively control tungsten influx in low density/collisionality operational regimes, similar to conventional boronization methods. A newly designed impurity powder dropper was installed onto AUG with 5m diameter BN powder, and 50 m B powder (99%+ purity) loaded into separate dropper assemblies. The sub-mm powder particles are gravitationally accelerated into the upper edge of a lower single null H-mode plasma. Discharges with IP = 800 kA, ne = 6x1019 m-3, PNBI = 10 MW , and a conformal boundary shape were used for the conditioning sequences. These were followed by different discharges to evaluate the effects of the conditioning.
The first experiment was performed with five BN conditioning discharges, in which injected B was varied from ~4x1018 atoms/discharge to ~4x1020 atoms/discharge. Visible spectroscopy measurements at the outer limiter showed increases in both boron and nitrogen signal levels, well as elevated boron levels in the divertor and an increase in PRAD by greater than a factor of 2. Globally the BN injection also improved energy confinement by 10-20%, similar to gaseous N2 injection. Discharges with increasing B injection rates were also performed. Injecting, 9.2x1021 atoms of pure B resulted in minimal impact on plasma performance and up to 50% increase in radiated power. To test the conditioning effect of B powder, a sequence of discharges with magnetic perturbations for ELM suppression were conducted afterwards. Historically these discharges are very sensitive to wall conditions. However, following the B conditioning discharges, all three attempts to run low density discharges with ELMs suppressed by magnetic perturbations were successful. These preliminary results suggest that the application of B containing powders can be used to both improve plasma performance in real-time, and improve wall conditions. Furthermore the injection system is capable of injecting a wide number of impurities (B, BN, B4C, Li, C, Sn, Mo, W, …) for a range of studies. Similar systems are being installed on the EAST and DIII-D devices. Results from these and forthcoming studies on AUG, and possibly other devices, will be reported. The U.S. authors supported by U.S. Dept. of Energy contract DE-AC02-09CH11466.
M. Okabayashi
Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, PO Box 451, Princeton, NJ 08543-0451, USA
mokabaya@pppl.gov
DIII-D experiments on control of locked tearing modes are in good qualitative
agreement with predictions of a non-linear reduced MHD code (AEOLUS-IT) [1].
Robust avoidance of locked tearing modes that may cause disruptions is a prerequisite
for successful ITER operation. We have tested model predictions that entrainment of
a locked mode by a rotating 3D field screens out the error field that caused the initial
locking. The plasma condition was the ITER base line scenario target with low safety
factor discharges. The simulation is nonlinear, but highlights the fundamental process
by simplifying the physics to a zero beta, single helicity case with m/n=2/1, using
only the vorticity equation and Ohm’s law without any additional transport properties.
Experiment and simulation both show coupling between the locked mode and a stable
kink around the rational surface, and the screening that follows a bifurcation event in
which the mode becomes locked to the rotating applied field. Experiments in DIII-D
have illuminated some of the critical physical processes in the interaction of a locked
tearing mode with a rotating 3D field, including torque balance bifurcation and
entrainment in the presence of a static error field. Time evolution of local mode
structure near q=2 rational surface including the perturbed rotation profile using
Charge Exchange Recombination (CER) has been very useful for the comparisons.
Predictive understanding of mode evolution is crucial to the design of locked mode
control schemes that will help to avoid disruptions in present and future devices, and
the non-linear reduced MHD model AEOLUS-IT is in good qualitative agreement
with experimental observations. Such models will enable design of experiments on
locked mode control and other nonlinear MHD processes in present devices, and
extrapolation of these studies to large-scale experiments such as in ITER.
This work was supported in part by the US Department of Energy under DE-AC02-
09CH11466, DE-FC02-04ER54698, DE-FG02-04ER54761
(1) S. Inoue et al., NF 2017 57, 116020-10, S. Inoue et al., PPCF 2018 online
A novel capability has been added to the DIII-D neutral beam injection system, enabling in-shot variation of beam energy and current for the first time [1]. This new capability is now being explored as a tool for integrated control and optimization of equilibrium profiles and Alfvén eigenmode (AE) activity. The capability provides an alternative to the typically used pulse-width-modulation approach to controlling beam injection, and enables continuous variation of torque in the zero-torque regime. The capability also enables optimizing current drive and heating by injecting at lower energy during current ramp and at higher energy later in discharges. The first feedback algorithm making use of the new actuation approach has been experimentally tested, demonstrating stored energy and rotation control while addressing many of the challenges specific to using beam energy and current variation as an actuator. These challenges include constraints on the magnitude of beam voltage and current, slew rate limits on voltage changes, and lag between requested and achieve beam parameters. A real-time optimization-based control algorithm was developed that determines the voltage, current, and duty cycle required at steady state to maintain the optimal stored energy and rotation values, while accounting for the limits on voltage and current. The algorithm compensates the slow response of the voltage through fast adjustments of the current to more quickly track the required power and torque. The power and torque requests are augmented with a feedback term to improve energy and rotation target tracking. In a related experiment, a real-time ECE signal was used to detect AE mode activity and vary the NBI power through beam modulation based on feedback on the mode amplitude. This demonstration of AE mode control also showed that the ratio of the measured neutron rate to the classical predicted value, an indication of the effect of the AE mode on fast ion confinement, was changed through the variation of AE mode amplitude. The results of these two experiments motivate further development to integrate the new actuation and feedback approaches to control equilibrium parameters, including rotation and q, along with AE mode activity.
Supported by U.S.D.O.E. Contract No. DE-AC02-09CH11466 and DE-FC02-04ER54698.
[1] J. Rauch et al., Fusion Science and Technology 72, 3, (2017)
It is shown for the first time that global exhaust of helium, measured by effective helium particle confinement time (𝛕p,He), is improved during edge localized mode (ELM) suppression by resonant magnetic field perturbations (RMP) in high confinement (H-mode) ITER-shaped tokamak plasmas at DIII-D. An up to 40% reduction of 𝛕p,He during RMP-ELM suppression compared to ELMy H-mode discharges without RMP fields was measured using He test pulses in the upper outboard midplane. The ratio 𝛕p,He/𝛕E is reduced from 13 to 11 during RMP ELM suppression, showing that the improvement in He removal from the system exceeds the impact of RMP fields on energy confinement, bringing this ratio closer to the canonical threshold for a fusion reactor of 𝛕p,He/𝛕E<10.
To understand the cause of this important observation, we assess the changes to He confinement and exhaust in a three-reservoir model consisting of the core, plasma edge/SOL, and neutral reservoirs. Global He exhaust from the system depends on the exhaust from the confined plasma domain into the SOL and the neutral reservoir, where neutralized He is eventually removed by the pump. However, the removal rate (pumping efficiency) for He is low, and it recycles many times before being pumped. Therefore, retaining He in the plasma peripheral regions (SOL and neutral domain) without back-fueling of the plasma is vital for the He exhaust cycle.
Measurements of He and D2 neutral pressures in the pump plenum from Penning gauges show the partial pressure of He increases substantially more than that of D2 during RMP-ELM suppression, in comparison with the ELMing H-mode. This selective increase in He concentration suggests a preferential enhancement of He exhaust into the neutral domain, rather than a simple link to main species ‘pumpout’, and provides substantial evidence of strong He retention in the plasma periphery during RMP ELM suppression, which is a necessary condition to improve removal of He from the system. The He density in the edge confined region measured with charge exchange recombination spectroscopy also shows an enhanced rate of decay during RMP ELM suppression. These first-time findings are important for ITER, where application of RMP fields is planned for ELM control, as they suggest application of RMP ELM suppression could replace the impurity exhaust produced by the ELM events.
The boundary heat flux width ($λ_q$) is an important part of the power exhaust challenge in magnetic confinement fusion reactors. Understanding what sets $λ_q$ has largely been an empirical science [1], however physics understanding is progressing [3-6]. A database of $λ_q$ in H-mode indicated that the poloidal magnetic field ($B_p$) was the only significant parameter associated with the heat flux width: $λ_q~B_p^{-1.19}$ [1]. The maximum $B_p$ in the database was ~0.8 T, whereas ITER at 15 MA will be ~1.2 T.
C-Mod has been the only diverted tokamak capable of operating at reactor-relevant $B_p$, now with measurements up to 1.3 T. These new measurements in EDA H-mode clearly follow the inverse scaling of $λ_q$ with $B_p$ to values exceeding ITER-level. The heuristic drift (HD) model [4,5] has done a remarkable job of reproducing the trend and the magnitude of $λ_q$ in the database. The new high-field data from C-Mod are consistent with the HD model. Perhaps more importantly, the new data provide a benchmark for first principles models [6,7], one of which projects [6] to ~10 times larger $λ_q$ than the empirical $B_p$ scaling for ITER. In addition, we have assembled a database of $λ_q$ consisting of over 300 shots that span nearly the entire operating space of Alcator C-Mod (L-, H- and I-modes) under attached divertor conditions. As in earlier studies [8], $λ_q$ at fixed $B_p$ exhibit significant scatter that appears related to the core plasma confinement. We are presently exploring correlations of $λ_q$ with global and pedestal parameters; we will report on the latest results at this meeting. The database now includes a composite of measurements made by surface thermocouples and Langmuir probes. Improved spatial resolution and heat flux dynamic range over IR thermography allows for more accurate fits of $λ_q$ and resolving the role of transport into the private flux region. We find that the assumption of symmetric spreading of heat flux [1] is not appropriate under many conditions.
[1] T. Eich, et al., Nucl. Fusion 53 (2013) 093031. [2] R.J. Goldston, et al., Nucl. Fusion 52 (2012) 013009. [3] R.J. Goldston, J. Nucl. Mat. 463 (2015) 397-400. [4] C.S. Chang, et al., Nucl. Fusion 57 (2017) 116023. [5] B. Chen, et al., “Progress towards modeling…”, submitted to Phys. Plasmas. [6] B. LaBombard, et al., Phys. Plasmas 18 (2011) 056104.
RMP ELM suppression experiments at ITER-like conditions (shape, collisionality, RMP spectrum) in DIII-D show little splitting of the heat flux to the divertor targets, despite robust splitting in the particle flux. This lack of divertor heat flux splitting is a potentially important result for ITER because splitting of the divertor heat flux into multiple lobes displaced from the primary strike point could complicate heat flux handling during RMP ELM suppression in ITER and other tokamaks with tight divertor baffling. In DIII-D, strike point splitting is routinely observed in the divertor particle flux during RMP operation. The observed splitting is consistent with the toroidal mode number n of the perturbation, but the measured separation of the divertor particle flux lobes exceeds predictions of a vacuum model by factors of 3-5. Similar splitting in the heat flux profile would have serious consequences for heat flux handling during RMP ELM suppression in ITER. However, there is little impact of these particle flux lobes on the measured divertor heat flux. The large particle flux lobe separations present a challenge for plasma response modeling, because the predicted response using linear, resistive MHD simulations is dominantly a screening response, which should reduce the divertor lobe splitting below the vacuum model predictions.
Current ramps, which were limited in amplitude for a subset of RMP coils to be consistent with force limits on the RMP coils in ITER, were used to modify the divertor lobes from an n = 3 to an n = 2 pattern. The particle flux lobes changed during the RMP current ramps, but the heat flux profile was not affected, consistent with the lack of heat flux lobe structure. Possible synergistic effects of impurity gas injection and RMP current ramps were also examined using neon and argon gas injection into the ELM suppressed phase. Both gases produced stable radiating mantles between 0.95≤ Ψ_N≤1, a 60% radiated power fraction, and significantly reduced heat flux to both strike points while ELM suppression was maintained. These results show that RMP ELM suppression in ITER-like conditions is compatible with an impurity radiation-enhanced boundary.
This work is supported by the US Department of Energy under DE-FG02-07ER54917, DE-FG02-05ER54809, DE-FC02-04ER54698, DE-SC0012706, DE-AC52-07NA27344, DE-NA0003525, and DE-AC04-94AL85000.
First-principles-based multiscale neoclassical-and-turbulent understanding of the impurity transport and its effect on the main plasma confinement is one of the most important subjects in magnetic fusion research. Seeding of impurity particles was found to improve the plasma confinement in the so-called “RI-mode” of operation [Weynants et al., Nucl. Fusion 39 (1999)]. More recently tungsten (W) impurities have been found to degrade the pedestal confinement of JET ILW H-mode plasma while a seeding of nitrogen (N) impurities reduces the degradation [Litaudon et al., 2017 Nucl. Fusion 57 (2017)]. In the present study, the total-f gyrokinetic code XGC1 [Chang et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 118 (2017) ] is used to understand the impurity transport in the whole-volume plasma and its effect on the main plasma confinement.
Recent total-f simulation by XGC1 [Kim et al., Phys. Plasmas 24 (2017)] showed that carbon (C) impurity can improve the main-ion confinement by reducing the ITG turbulence amplitude. In the presence of C+6 impurities, the self-organized deuteron temperature and its gradient were found to increase by up to $20%$ at all radial positions under the same central heating condition. This confinement enhancement was found to be caused by a stabilization effect due to both the impurity-wave interaction and the enhanced mean ExB shearing rate, rather than by the main-ion dilution effect. Another important finding is that the central peaking of impurity density in the saturated state is not as severe as what has been known from neoclassical theories. The neoclassical impurity inward-pinch is heavily opposed by the outward turbulent transport to yield only a mild impurity-density peaking in the saturated state. In these simulations, gyrokinetic deteron and carbon ions with Z_eff≃1.75 have been utilized with adiabatic electrons.
On-going research on the tungsten-nitrogen impurity transport and its impact on the H-mode pedestal in JET plasmas in realistic divertor geometry will also be presented. Starting with the impact of W-impurity on the neoclassical ExB shearing profile in a JET pedestal. Transport of the W and N particles into the central core will be included in the discussion. For whole-volume simulations, we will use new core-edge coupling technique developed in the High-fidelity Whole-Device-Modeling program of the Exascale Computing Project.
“NTT” is a unique reactor concept based on “power-handling-first“ philosophy by locating long-leg (~2.7m) divertor at outboard side with negative triangularity δ<0 and making flux tube expansion to maximize heat exhaust surfaces (grazing angle ~2°).
Our previous design (Ip=21MA, A=Rp/ap=3, Rp=9m, HH=1.12, Bt=5.86T) uses standard magnet design based on the wedge support and maximum field is limited to 13.6T due to stress limit 800MPa and large reactor size. It allows adoption of currently available Nb3Sn superconductor at 4.5K as well as Bi2122/Pb high Tc superconductor at 20K. NTT configuration has technical merits of having space in the inboard except narrowest point to place the blanket piping and auxiliary systems such as pellet injector line and ECH waveguides. Outward placing of the divertor is favorable for pumping conductance.
Parameter studies on impact of high Bt and HH for A=3, 3.5 are shown where HHIpA=69.3MA, n/nGW=0.85 and qcy=3.5 are fixed. The reduction of major radius to Rp=7m is possible with improved confinement (HH=1.5) while Bmax is nearly constant. In this case, fusion power is reduced to Pf=2GW and the neutron wall load stays almost constant qn~1.4-1.5MW/m2 while the normalized beta βN becomes higher βN=2.9. For fixed HH=1.2, higher Bmax=16T enables to reduce major radius to Rp=7m. In this case, fusion power Pf and neutron wall load qn increases while βN stays almost constant. For A=3.5, we observe similar trend. The plasma volume is smaller (Vp~1000m3) compared with A=3 case (Vp~1500m3). But requirement for Bmax for fixed HH=1.2 becomes rather high Bmax=19.5T. With improved confinement (HH=1.5), reduction of major radius to Rp=7m is possible leading to Ip=13.3MA, Bt=7.53T, n=0.9 x 1020 m-3, Pf=1.9GW, Bmax=15.5T, PCD=115MW (\eta CD=0.5 x 1020 A/m2W is assumed). We made configuration design for this case and the equilibrium calculation. Extended wedge support allows σmax within 800MPa at 4.5K. It is concluded that both high magnetic field and high confinement are important for the realization of reasonably compact NTT fusion reactor as future R&D.
A lithium vapor-box configuration [1] has been proposed to provide volumetric radiative dissipation in the divertor region of tokamak plasmas. While recent experiments have achieved continuous vapor shielding in close proximity to a lithium coated target in Magnum-PSI [2], this approach seeks to provide controlled detachment far from the divertor target, in a lithium vapor cloud maintained through controlled evaporation and kept away from the main plasma through baffling and recondensation.
We performed edge-plasma simulations with the geometry and parameters of the recent FNSF study [3]. A set of calculations are performed with the 2D UEDGE plasma model and a simple diffusive neutral model [4]. To mimic a crude vapor-box, Li vapor is injected near the divertor plate from the private-flux and outer divertor leg regions and is removed assuming a wall albedo of 0.5 on both PF and outer walls, which allows steady state solutions. For a range of Li vapor input, steady-state, detached-plasma solutions are shown where well over 90% of the exhaust power is radiated by Li, resulting in peak surface heat fluxes ≤ 2 MW/m^2 on the divertor plate, outer wall, and?private-flux wall. While Li ions?dominate in the divertor leg, their density is much less?than the DT density at the midplane. Here the key?issue is possible dilution of the core DT fuel.
We also developed a simulation of the neutral lithium vapor flow in the divertor using the Stochastic PArallel Rarefied-gas Time- accurate Analyzer (SPARTA) Direct Simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) code [5]. We have simulated the open geometry of the present FNSF design, as well as begun studies using (so far) a single baffle. While the original open geometry allows 75% of the lithium absorption in the plasma to occur in the far SOL, distant from the divertor leg, this is reduced to 5% through the use of a single baffle.
[1] R.J. Goldston, G.W. Hammett, M.A. Jaworski, J. Schwartz, Nucl. Mat. Eng. 12 (2017) 1118
[2] P. Rindt, ISLA Conference, Moscow 2017
[3] C.E. Kessel, J.P. Blanchard, A. Davis et al., Fusion Eng. Design (2017),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fusengdes.2017.05.081.?
[4] T.D. Rognlien, M.E. Rensink, and D.P. Stotler, Fusion Eng. Design (2017),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fusengdes.2017.07.024
[5] M.A Gallis et al., AIP Conference Proceedings 1628, 27 (2014); doi: 10.1063/1.4902571
The liquid lead-lithium (PbLi) blanket concept has become a promising design for fusion DEMO and power plant reactors. To promote the successful application of fusion energy, some R&D; activities on the PbLi blanket have been performed, such as structure material corrosion, thermal hydraulics, magnetic-hydrodynamic (MHD) effect, coolant impurities technology and LOCA/LOFA, etc.. Therefore, it is so important to develop experimental facility to perform the out of pile experiments and studies on these key issues before the engineering design of fusion reactor.
Series DRAGON PbLi experimental loops have been developed and constructed in China, including the thermal convection PbLi loops DRAGON-I (500ºC) and DRAGON-II (700ºC), and the multi-functional liquid PbLi experimental loop DRAGON-IV (800ºC, 2T). To perform the integrated experiments under the multi-physical field conditions for DEMO blanket, the dual coolant thermal hydraulic integrated experimental loop DRAGON-V was designed and finished the construction in 2017. It is composed of a lead-lithium loop and a helium gas loop. The maximum flow rate of PbLi and helium gas pressure are 40 kg/s and 10.5 MPa, respectively. The magnetic field is designed up to 5T. It is a unique test platform for the R&D; of thermal hydraulic, material corrosion, purification technology and safety issues of liquid PbLi blanket to provide the necessary database for ITER-TBM and DEMO-TBM.
Up to now, some experiments have been conducted to investigate the key issues of PbLi technologies, such as corrosion behaviors of candidate structural materials with and without magnetic field, the PbLi alloy fabrication with high-level controlling of the impurities, purification technology of liquid PbLi coolant in the loop, MHD pressure drop test, and the interaction for typical coolants during accidents etc.. The results can support the development of the in-pile key techniques and components and the engineering design for ITER-TBM and DEMO-TBM, and also contribute to the final application of the advanced reactors.
As one of typical blanket concepts for Chinese Fusion Engineering Test Reactor (CFETR), a conceptual structure of helium cooled solid breeder (HCSB) blanket was designed by USTC. Considering that electromagnetic load is one of the main concerns for the blanket module, a FEM (finite element method) model of the HCSB was developed and the electromagnetic analysis of the blanket module was implemented using a finite element analysis (FEA) software called MAXWELL. For transient electromagnetic analysis with the vertical displacement event (VDE), a more accurate model where the plasma described by 69 filaments was adopted and the whole 15 blankets lying in a toroidal-poloidal section were explored. The research of the ferromagnetic effect of RAFM steel was carried out and the magnetic field, induced eddy currents, the magnetic force were computed and analyzed. The analysis results show that ferromagnetic effect broadened the range of magnetic field of the model and strengthened eddy current effects. In addition, the maximum value of the eddy current density was 71.2 MA/m2 and the maximum magnitude of the electromagnetic forces was 1409.0 kN under the ferromagnetic effect.
A central challenge in the years to come is to start providing a unified view of magnetised plasma turbulence in regimes of experimental relevance –with near-critical parameters and flux-driven self-organisation– when multiple scales and disparate regions of the plasma self-consistently interplay.
We here present a comprehensive discussion of turbulence properties when confined core, edge and Scrape-Off-Layer (SOL) regions interplay, based on well-diagnosed ToreSupra discharges and flux-driven gyrokinetic computations recently extended to modelling the outer edge and SOL regions where commonly assumed separations of scales tend to break down. Various regimes of electrostatic turbulence: Ion Temperature Gradient (ITG) and Trapped Electron Mode (TEM) are investigated in near-critical flux-driven regimes. Advanced statistical properties of transport, rotation and poloidal asymmetries are analysed and detailed confrontation with high-precision reflectometry is presented, through the use of dedicated synthetic diagnostics.
Steady-State Superconducting Tokamak-1 (SST-1) has 16 Toroidal field (TF) and 9 superconducting poloidal field (PF) coils rated for 10 kA DC. TF coils are connected in series and operated in DC condition, whereas PF coils are operated independently in pulse mode. SST-1 current feeder system (CFS) houses 9 pairs of PF superconducting current leads and 1 pair of TF superconducting current leads. The SST-1 CFS had observed arcing incidences during OT discharge in past SST-1 campaigns. Similar arcing incidences have also been observed in other tokamaks devices also like KSTAR, W7X, and EAST. The conditions which led to the electrical arcing in SST-1 CFS, thereby resulting in severe damages to PF current leads and helium Hydraulic lines will be presented in this paper. As an important preventive measure to avoid such arcing at PF current leads during SST-1 operation, insulation strengthening processes of the PF current leads have been initiated to increase the voltage withstand capability of the PF current leads. In the view of same, development of an insulation scheme using combination of polyimide and GFRP along with DGEBA epoxy resin and its validation at lab scale has been carried out. It involves study of chemical kinetics of resin towards curing cycle, electrical and mechanical characterizations of insulation samples at room temperature as well as at LN2 temperature. A breakdown voltage of > 25 kV DC has been successfully achieved with ~1.2 mm of insulation thickness at lab scale insulation samples. In order to validate the proposed insulation system under specified Helium Paschen conditions, a lab scale setup considering SST-1 operational requirements has been developed. The operation, salient features of test setup and results will also be presented in this paper. The progressive development of insulation system and validation from prototype scale to half -dummy current lead scale and thereafter implementation on actual PF current leads will also be presented in this paper.
Tight regulation of the burn condition in ITER has been proven possible even under time-dependent variations in the fuel concentration by the use of robustification techniques. One of the most fundamental control problems arising in ITER and future burning-plasma tokamaks is the regulation of the plasma temperature and density to produce a determined amount of fusion power while avoiding possible thermal instabilities. Such problem, known as burn control, will require the development of controllers that integrate all the available actuators in the tokamak. Moreover, the complex dynamics of the burning plasma and the uncertain nature of some of its magnitudes suggest that nonlinear, robust burn controllers will be necessary. Available actuators in the burn control problem are auxiliary power modulation, fueling rate modulation, and impurity injection. Also, recent experiments in the DIII-D tokamak have shown that in-vessel coil-current modulation can be used for burn control purposes. The in-vessel coils generate non-axisymmetric magnetic fields that have the capability to decrease the plasma-energy confinement time, which allows for regulating the plasma energy during positive energy perturbations. In this work, in-vessel coil-current modulation is included in the control scheme, and it is used in conjunction with the other previously mentioned actuators to design a nonlinear burn controller which is robust to variations in the deuterium-tritium concentration of the fueling lines. Furthermore, fueling rate modulation is not only used to control the plasma density, but also to control the plasma energy if necessary by means of isotopic fuel tailoring. Isotopic fuel tailoring is a particular way of fueling the burning plasma which allows for reducing the fusion power produced and, therefore, also gives the opportunity to decrease the plasma energy when needed. The model-based nonlinear controller is synthesized from a zero-dimensional model of the burning-plasma dynamics. A nonlinear simulation study is used to illustrate the successful controller performance in an ITER-like scenario in which unknown variations of the deuterium-tritium concentration of the fueling lines are emulated.
Solenoid free start-up scenario is the way to utilize loop voltage from the evolution of equilibrium field using outer PF coils. Also, it can be expected to be as an attractive start-up scheme in the fusion machines with low aspect ratio since flux from external inductance change can be utilized. The solenoid free start-up experiments using outer PF coils have been conducted in various devices, but the results show the failure of closed flux surface (CFS) formation or low plasma current with sufficient ECH power. With de creasing vertical field, the experiments for formation of CFS shows that improved pre-ionization with EBW enhances the initiated plasma current by lowering plasma resistivity. The CFS is formed successfully when the poloidal field from plasma current exceeds the vacuum vertical field and the quantitative condition for CFS formation has been derived in the consideration of pre-ionization plasma resistivity. The pre-ionization plasma with low resistivity is necessary for CFS formation. The enhanced particle confinement along mirror ratio in TPC is helpful for lowering resistivity of pre-ionization plasma near outboard and EBW collisionless heating makes possible to have lower resistivity of pre-ionization plasma due to the existence of 2nd or 3rd harmonics near outboard. After the successful CFS formation, the plasma current has been demonstrated to be ramped-up with loop voltage from outer PF coils with help of reduced external inductance. The plasma current evolution has been presented with 0-dimensional power balance modeling with consideration about force balance along plasma current. The initial plasma current evolution has difficulty due to the size of CFS that causes resistive dissipation. Also, the induction voltage from outer PF coils has limitation that it is not easy to change rapidly due to eddy current from vessel wall and causes increase of vertical field that affects to CFS formation and equilibrium. The solenoid free start-up using outer PF coils must consider the distribution between flux from external inductance and resistive dissipation. The solenoid free start-up scheme utilizing outer PF coils has been suggested considering the condition of CFS formation including the location and minor radius of CFS and resistivity of pre-ionization plasma.
Stable and robust ITER Baseline Scenario demonstration discharges have been achieved in DIII-D at zero injected input torque (matching the ITER LSN shape including the aspect ratio, betaN=1.9-2.05, and q95=3), and repeated under various conditions (Ip, density, wall conditions). However, an alternate route to Q=10 conditions has been explored that starts at higher q95 and maximum BT. Performance to reach 500 MW of fusion power is reached at all torque levels. With co-NBI, the goal is reached by 11 MA equivalent, and the achieved beta does not increase above 12.5 MA. At zero torque, 13.5 MA may be sufficient to reach P_fus=500 MW. The gain metric βτ does not improve above 13 MA equivalent (which corresponds to q95~3.7), and all torque curves show the same trends for the evolution to saturation. This indicates that this saturation effect, observed previously in DIII-D, is not likely to be due to an ExB shear effect.
Comparing 15 and 13 MA equivalent cases, three causes for the confinement changes will be assessed: (i) differences in dimensionless parameters such as rho, beta, nu, q; (ii) increase in the sawtooth inversion radius at higher current; (iii) broadening of the NBI deposition profile. The fusion gain metric beta*tau saturates around the 13 MA equivalent mark for all torque values, so the benefits to fusion energy performance of increasing current may not be fully realized. Further study is needed to determine the origin of this.
We present new experimental measurements of the Lower Hybrid (LH) wave electric field vector, $E_{LH}$, obtained in Alcator C-Mod and provide a direct comparison with 3D full-wave COMSOL simulations using the cold plasma dielectric tensor and reflectometry measured density profiles. Two key results are reported: 1) The direction of $E_{LH}$ was found to have a substantial poloidal component and is in strong disagreement with the nearly radial full-wave simulation result. 2) Adding Scrape Off Layer (SOL) density fluctuations to the density profile implemented in the full-wave simulations can be used to explain the $E_{LH}$ direction discrepancy.
Polarized passive optical emission spectroscopy was implemented to determine $E_{LH}$. This technique entails measuring two orthogonally polarized $D_\beta$ spectral line profiles. The spectra are simultaneously fit to the Schrodinger equation containing both magnetic and time periodic electric field operators. The three components of $E_{LH}$ are the only fit variables. The experimental $E_{LH}$ results were compared to axisymmetry 3D full-wave COMSOL simulations via a synthetic diagnostic. Comparing the experimental and simulation results, good agreement was found with regard to the magnitude of $E_{LH}$ both as a function of measurement location and LH power. However, it was found experimentally that $E_{LH}$ contained a poloidal component having a magnitude on the order or greater than that of the radial component. The poloidal component was found to be a strong function of poloidal angle, increasing towards the midplane, and a weak function of toroidal angle, remaining nearly constant. This result strongly disagrees with the nearly radial $E_{LH}$ predicted by the full-wave simulations. SOL density fluctuations based on an experimentally verified 3D BOUT turbulence simulation of a similar Alcator C-Mod discharge were added to the density profile. We found that diffraction and scattering from a realistic turbulence model generates a substantial poloidal component in $E_{LH}$, significantly closing the gap between the experimental and simulation results. This result indicates that SOL turbulence can have a detrimental effect on LHCD performance if the wavelength is on the order of the turbulence characteristic scale length.
The ITER Cryostat, the largest stainless steel vacuum pressure chamber ever built which provides the vacuum confinement to components operating in ITER ranging from 4.5 k to 80 k. Cryostat Design Model was qualified[1] by ITER. As a Safety Important Class system, Design qualification at every change in its development and installation phases is mandatory. The Cryostat system is currently at manufacturing stage, several Deviation request are being reported e.g. tolerances change, ribs modification etc. These changes affect the behavior of Cryostat which needs re-assessment. The conventional design approach in Finite Element method (FEM) needs significant time and effort, as incorporation of changes calls for redevelopment of full mathematical model.
In this paper a “unique method” of developing FE model for complex systems like Cryostat is presented, which typically addresses above need and the method is qualified with results of Cryostat engineering model (CEM) [1,2]. This unique method involves dividing and meshing of the big components in to sub components, so the full Cryostat is divided into 30 sub components and mathematical models of these individual components are developed. These sub components are integrated using suitable constraint equations to create full FE model [3,4]. Then the integrity of model is assessed using the modes shapes. This unique method enables to incorporate component level changes without affecting the full FE model, thus saving time and efforts of re-development of mathematical model.
For qualification of developed FE model category II loading and selected load combinations are applied. The results obtained are in close approximation with CEM results [1,2]. As the present need was to address the changes of manufacturing model, so further Cryostat manufacturing FE model (CMM) is developed with this unique approach. It is then analyzed for category II loading and selected load combination.
This paper gives detailed insight about the developing and qualification of the Unique Method and details of the analysis results of CMM.
References
[1]ITER Cryostat—an overview and design progress, Fusion Engineering and Design 86(2011)
[2]The structure analysis of ITER Cryostat based on the FEM, Fusion Engineering and Design 88(2013)
[3]Instructional Material Complementing FEMA 451, Design Example, SI- 15-7-53
[4]ANSYS ref.
The edge of toroidally confined plasmas can be characterized by the presence of magnetic perturbations (MP) with helicity m/n, with m and n the poloidal and toroidal mode numbers, respectively. In the Reversed Field Pinch (RFP) RFX-mod device (R=2m, a=0.46m), in high-current discharges (Ip>1MA, n/nG<0.3), an almost monochromatic magnetic spectrum spontaneously develops, with m/n=1/7 the dominant mode rotating at a toroidal frequency of ~20Hz. This mode produces a helical equilibrium called quasi-single helicity (QSH). In this new equilibrium, which stands apart from the standard, chaotic RFP state, also the shape of the edge plasma is influenced, with a helical 1/7 plasma wall interaction (PWI). Were the QSH perfectly monochromatic, the edge would show a helical scrape-off layer (SOL) with good confinement properties, as shown in previous works on RFX. Unfortunately, the QSH is disturbed by the presence of high toroidal harmonics with 7 < n < 20 (“secondary modes”). These secondary modes, with amplitude one order of magnitude smaller than the dominant n=7 one, interact each other with a constructive interference, called mode or phase locking: the result is a local radial magnetic deformation sec that can be comparable to the dominant one, 1/7, due to the 1/7 mode. From the point of view of particle transport, the presence of the phase locking translates in a localized decrease (“hole”) in the helical pattern of the connection length to the wall: Lcw. This happens because magnetic field lines, in the vicinity of the locking, are deformed in large poloidal lobes (homoclinic tangles) hitting the plasma-facing components (PFCs), a mechanism similar to the toroidal “fingers” observed in tokamak divertors during RMP application.
A smoother magnetic boundary is expected in the upgraded RFX-mod, where the magnetic deformation decreases by a factor 2-3. Initial estimates show that the local “hole” of Lcw should be strongly reduced by halving the secondary mode amplitude: this is a promising perspective for the RFP helical state performance.
R.C. O’Neill1, M. Brookman1, J.S. deGrassie1, B. Fishler1, M. LeSher1, C. Moeller1, C. Murphy1, A. Nagy2, M. Smiley1, J. F. Tooker1, H. Torreblanca1
1General Atomics, PO Box 85608, San Diego, California 92186-5608, USA
2 Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Princeton NJ 08543, USA
Corresponding author: oneill@fusion.gat.com
A new current drive system is being designed and fabricated for the DIII-D tokamak to drive current in high beta discharges, using electromagnetic helicon waves. The high power helicon antenna (HPHA) is expected to couple 1 MW of power into the DIII-D plasmas at a frequency of 476 MHz without degrading the plasma characteristics or introducing metal impurities. This high power traveling wave antenna array is expected to have higher efficiency in driving current than other typical tokamak systems. The HPHA is a 30 CuCrZr module array mounted on a series of back plates. The modules inductively couple and resonate with the adjacent module. The two end modules are connected to a dual inner conductor strip-line transmitting RF power to and from four, 15 cm dia. vacuum coaxial feed-throughs located at the two DIII-D upper vessel ports. The modules, pitched 15˚ to follow the magnetic field lines of the tokamak, are bolted to 6 water cooled back-plates which are mounted on pedestals welded to the vessel wall. A description of the design and analyses of the HPHA and the RF strip-line feeds with anticipated overall antenna performance is presented.
This work is supported by DOE under DE-FC02-04ER54698.
Significant progress in applying ICRF power to ASDEX Upgrade (AUG) has been achieved in the last years; this progress has been associated with a similar progress in our understanding and capability to model the relevant processes. The two main challenges of the ICRF system (power coupling and impurity production) have been tackled successfully.
First, the outer mid-plane gas injection techniques that improve the coupling of the fast wave to the confined plasma by increasing the density in front of ICRF antenna have been well established experimentally and consistently modelled numerically. With midplane gas puffing, the local edge density increase in front of the antenna leads to a shift of the fast wave cut-off position closer to the antenna by 2cm. The results were confirmed with the new density measurements in front of the antenna. The ICRF coupling increases by 120 pct (25 pct for top gas puffing).
Second, with the installation of the 3-strap antennas in AUG, it was clearly demonstrated that the ICRF-specific tungsten (W) sputtering can be successfully mitigated with a proper antenna design. The reduction of the W sputtering with the 3-strap antennas has been achieved by minimising the RF currents on the antenna surfaces that are exposed to the scrape-off-layer (SOL) plasma. The strap power balance measurements confirm that the local RF currents, rectified DC currents and the W sputtering yield at the antenna side limiters experience a clear minimum close to a phasing between the central and the outer straps of 180 deg and a power balance ratio Pcen/Pout of 2. For this optimal choice, the local source of sputtered W at the limiters is reduced by a factor between 1.5 and 6, depending on the location. This is understood, modelled and confirms the hypothesis of sheath rectification as the source of the sputtered W.
Furthermore, the new 3-ion ICRF heating scenario, which can produce very energetic particles, has been successfully reproduced in AUG.
The progress in operation, as well as in understanding and modelling capability is strongly supported by improved ICRF diagnostic coverage including density measurements directly in front of the antenna by reflectometry, advanced RF coupling characterisation, measurements of antenna limiter currents, B-dot probes, Ion Cyclotron Emission (ICE) measurements as well as by the dedicated test arrangement IShTAR.
Uncontrolled termination of post-disruption runaway electron (RE) current can cause deep localized melting of the first wall and this poses a serious challenge to the successful operation of fusion grade tokamaks, including ITER. Since the deconfinement of REs depends on the timescale of flux surface reformation and the plasma stability itself is affected by the runaway current, the interaction between REs and MHD is highly non-linear and has important consequences. This is the motivation of the present work, that complements the tracer particle approach for REs. The final goal is the self-consistent modeling of REs in a disrupted plasma through non-linear MHD simulations of disruption.
In this contribution, we present results that focus on the interaction of resistive MHD modes with runaway electron growth. This is modeled by extending the non-linear MHD code JOREK by including a fluid model for the evolution of runaway electron density. Runaway generation due to Dreicer as well as the avalanche sources are included (with an option for initializing an arbitrary RE seed profile), with advection contributions from parallel runaway velocity and an ${E}\times{B}$ drift. The first studies shown here are based on pseudo thermal quenches that are obtained by artifically increasing the perpendicular thermal conductivity ${k}_{\perp}$ of the plasma in equilibrium, which in turn triggers the generation of REs.
The JOREK model with REs is applied to analyse the interaction of the $\left(1,1\right)$ resistive internal kink with runaway electrons, given that the resistive kink is naturally destabilized due to the peakedness of the RE current profile that can lead to the central safety factor $q_0$ dropping below unity. A numerical study of this problem was carried out recently using the spectral MHD code EXTREM , where several simplifying assumptions were made, such as an independent thermal decay, decoupling RE current from perpendicular ${E}\times{B}$ dynamics and the neglect of parallel fluid velocity $V_{||}$. In our study, an attempt is made towards a more comprehensive treatment of the problem. The effect of the mode growth on the RE seed redistribution and the final RE profiles will be discussed in addition to the influence of REs on the mode excitation and dynamics.The effects of pre-disruption $q_0$ and the thermal quench rates will be studied.
Vertical displacement events (VDEs) where the plasma moves rapidly towards the wall can cause large electromagnetic forces on the vessel structures with possible damaging effects for large tokamaks. Non-axisymmetric modes developing during the VDE can lead to asymmetric, sometimes rotating forces on the vessel which can be even more severe. Large-scale 3D simulations play a crucial role on the path towards assessing and preventing the damaging effects of VDEs on vessel components in future large tokamaks like ITER.
We use the high-order finite element code M3D-C^1 [1] to perform 2D and 3D nonlinear MHD simulations of VDEs in tokamaks including a resistive wall model [2]. In order to develop predictive capabilities, the simulation results are benchmarked with other codes as well as validated against existing experimental measurements.
2D and 3D nonlinear MHD simulations of VDEs are based on and validated against discharges in NSTX [3] as well as DIII-D. The results of a set of axisymmetric VDE calculations based on NSTX discharge #132859 show the sensitivities of the early VDE evolution to different parameters, in particular the halo resistivity. 3D simulations show how non-axisymmetric modes arise in the late VDE phase and lead to a stochastization of the magnetic field lines which allows for an efficient release of thermal energy into the wall. The thermal quench is followed by a fast decay of the plasma current and rise of the wall current.
A detailed benchmarking activity between the M3D-C^1 code and the 3D nonlinear MHD code NIMROD [4] based on an NSTX discharge is being performed. The comparison of axisymmetric VDE calculations is focused on the early VDE growth and the wall forces. We plan to extent this benchmark to 3D simulations with a 2D wall. In addition, an axisymmetric benchmark between the M3D-C^1 code and the CarMaONL code [5] based on a standard ITER scenario using a simplified 2D model of the ITER first wall is in progress.
[1] S. C. Jardin, et al., Comput. Sci. Discov. 5, 014002 (2012).
[2] N. M. Ferraro, et al., Phys. Plasmas 23, 056114 (2016).
[3] D. Pfefferle, et al., Phys. Plasmas (2018). Submittted.
[4] C. R. Sovinec, et al., J. Comput. Phys. 195, 355 (2004).
[5] F. Villone, et al, Plasma Phys. Controlled Fusion 55, 095008 (2013).
Plasma termination by excess fuelling or impurity interaction is a safety relevant event in potential fusion reactors. Sudden termination of plasma operation is an aspect that enters material requirements in terms of released energies, localization and respective time-scales of the plasma terminating event. In tokamaks, such events may lead to disruptions or thermal quenches. While disruptions are not expected in (currentless) stellarator/heliotron operation, thermal quenches are certainly to be illuminated for reactor scale stellarators and heliotrons as well. This report is a study on plasma termination in TJ-II, W7-X and LHD. The confinement in W7-X and LHD allows one to study long-mean-free-path collisionality conditions in the plasma core.
Evidence for stellarator/heliotron specific behavior is given by the spatio-temporal evolution of the electron temperature. After the injection of two fuelling pellets into an LHD discharge, the second pellet induces a cooling of the plasma center leading to a temperature hole after about 100ms (tau_E). It is concluded that the stationary confining field has a beneficial impact. In TJ-II, the peaking of TESPEL particle deposition closer to the centre facilitates plasma recovery. For W7-X, plasma termination due to massive LBO tungsten injection shows energy decay by cooling of the plasma. The electron temperature decays on the time scale of energy confinement (~100ms), while the plasma density remains almost constant (even slightly increasing). The plasma is finally terminated along with a strong increase of radiation representatively shown here as increase of impurity lines due to wall material (iron). Similar evolution of temperature and density is observed after iron impurities terminating ICRH long pulse experiments on LHD.
The systematic comparison of plasma terminating events by cryogenic pellets, induced impurity injection or changes of the heating gives evidence that the observed termination takes place on a time scale corresponding to the energy confinement time. Close to marginal termination, the beneficial effect of stellarator confinement of the vacuum field leads to transient plasmas that are cold in the center but may recover after typically 1s. The findings indicate the benign impact on transient loads in case of plasma termination in stellarators and heliotrons.
The Divertor Tokamak Test Facility (DTT) is a new tokamak whose
construction has recently been approved by the Italian government. DTT
will be a high field superconducting toroidal device (6 T) carrying
plasma current up to 6 MA in pulses with length up to 100s, with an
up-down symmetrical D-shape defined by major radius R=2.10 m, minor
radius a=0.65 m and average triangularity 0.3. The main role of DTT is
to contribute to the development of a reliable solution for the power
and particle exhaust in a reactor, a challenge commonly recognised as
one of the major issues in the road map towards the realisation of a
nuclear fusion power plant. Following the project approval, since June
2017 the design review of DTT has started. This paper will present the
device by summarizing its main physics goals and the present status of
the design.
Effective power exhaust by impurity seeding and its dependence on the gas species used was demonstrated in island divertor configurations for the first time at Wendelstein 7-X (W7-X).
A systematic set of experiments has been conducted during the first island divertor campaign which show that switching from Neon (Ne) to nitrogen (N2) as seeding gases enables switching from global to more localized edge cooling. In case of Ne seeding significant enhancement of edge radiation with slow decay after end of the injection is observed due to the high recycling properties of this noble gas. The N2 seeded discharges show immediate response of local plasma parameters at the divertor target correlated to the puff duration. Fast Te recovery and drop of Prad after end of the puff suggest a rather low recycling coefficient for this impurity species. These effects are analysed by 3D modeling with EMC3-EIRENE for high and low recycling coefficients.
The impact of the 3D edge magnetic structure on radiation is investigated experimentally by changing island size and connection lengths with the island control coils in the 5/5 configuration for scenarios with ne~1.8e19m-3 at PECRH~2.9MW. A 22ms Ne puff causes enhancement of Prad by ~1.6MW. Application of full control coil currents, Icc=2.5kA, yields a reduction of intrinsic Prad level from ~0.7MW to 0.3MW and an reduced increase of Prad by 1.1MW in response to Ne seeing. The change of island geometry results in a faster decay of total impurity radiation measured by an effective time constant \tau_{Prad}.
The presented findings on power exhaust control by impurity seeding in the W7-X island divertor are the basis for implementing radiative cooling as means to protect plasma facing components as performance levels at this new HELIAS stellarator are rising. With increasing performance, equilibrium effects will impact on the 3D magnetic structure, which is addressed by equilibrium reconstruction with V3FIT and the 3D MHD code HINT. Investigation of the link between the magnetic structure, the appropriate gas species, the injection location and the impurity transport is of critical importance for the high level goal of HELIAS divertor optimization. The experimental and numerical studies presented here represent a first-time consistent exploration of this field in the new island divertor configuration.