Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to Somers, Alex.
Outline • SRNL Fusion Research Highlights • Motivation • Hydrogen Isotope Separation • Cryogenic Distillation – Process and Column Design • CODFISH Code Description • Results • Future Work
~17.5 MeV of energy and 4He. • Plasma needs to be sustainable through tritium breeding for fuel. • Continuously fueled to achieve useful power production. • Requires high purity tritium and deuterium as fuels.
Tritium Start-up Inventory Requirements Current consensus has full inventory coming from CANDU reactors. • Assumes continued operation through 2035, yielding ~30 kg tritium. • Produced in the form of DTO, which requires separation for tritium extraction. • ITER will take between 10-20 kg. • DEMO will require ~15 kg. • Fuel cycle design requires minimum volume to fill plumbing in system beyond inventory necessary to reach break even. • With ~45 current private ventures, need massive uptick in tritium production to meet global need.