2018.5
Written by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor. At times FocusFusion.org levels a critical eye toward ITER. The massive international fusion project has an out-sized impact on fusion research funding while pursuing well traveled ground. We advocate for aneutronic approaches like those of LPPFusion and others. However, a pair of videos highlights the awesome scale of ITER. The videos amply show ITER to be unarguably an impressive engineering and management project. While the videos are a few years old, they nonetheless remain pertinent. ITER construction currently approaches the timeline covered in the first video. The video, mostly well done animation, shows the assembly of the major reaction chamber components in the tokamak building. In actuality, the tokamak building construction should […]
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Written by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor A team of scientists at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) won a DOE Office of Science award to develop new X-ray diagnostics for WEST, the Tungsten (W) Environment in Steady-state Tokamak, in France. The three-year, $1-million award will support the construction of two new devices at PPPL. This includes collaboration with French scientists and deployment of a post-doctoral researcher to test the installed devices. First of all, WEST is the upgrade to the Tora Supra, a French Tokamak situated at the nuclear research center of Cadarache, Bouches-du-Rhône in Provence. The WEST facility uses plasma-facing carbon components. Likewise, the National Spherical Torus Experiment-Upgrade (NSTX-U) at PPPL uses […]
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Written by Tim Lash, Focus Fusion Society Contributor New research results support the predicted performance of ITER. Good news for those diligently constructing the massive reactor in southern France. In plasma, electrons separate from their nucleus leaving behind ions. To continue heating plasma to fusion temperatures requires injecting more energy via radio frequency (RF) waves. Free electrons and ions respond to these waves differently leading to different temperatures for both plasma constituents. Scientists needed to better understand how these differences influence overall plasma temperature and density. The combination of temperatures within the plasma produce “multi-scale” turbulence. Turbulence can reduce fusion reaction rates. The scientists used a “reduced physics” computer model called TGLF. This model simplifies the massively parallel and costly […]
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