Inertial confinement fusion driver enhancements: Final focusing systems and compact heavy-ion driver designs

Technical Report · Wed Jul 17 00:00:00 EDT 1991

OSTI ID:7285049

Bieri, R L

Required elements of an inertial confinement fusion power plant are modeled and discussed. A detailed analysis of two critical elements of candidate drivers is done, and new component designs are proposed to increase the credibility and feasibility of each driver system. An analysis of neutron damage to the final elements of a laser focusing system is presented, and multilayer -- dielectric mirrors are shown to have damage lifetimes which axe too short to be useful in a commercial power plant. A new final-focusing system using grazing incidence metal mirrors to protect sensitive laser optics is designed and shown to be effective in extending the lifetime of the final focusing system. The reflectivities and damage limits of grazing incidence metal mirrors are examined in detail, and the required mirror sizes are shown to be compatible with the beam sizes and illumination geometries currently envisioned for laser drivers. A detailed design and analysis is also done for compact arrays of superconducting magnetic quadrupoles, which are needed in a multi-beam heavy-ion driver. The new array model is developed in more detail than some previous conceptual designs and models arrays which are more compact than arrays scaled from existing single -- quadrupole designs. The improved integrated model for compact arrays is used to compare the effects of various quadrupole array design choices on the size and cost of a heavy-ion driver. Array design choices which significantly affect the cost of a heavy-ion driver include the choice of superconducting material and the thickness of the collar used to support the winding stresses. The effect of these array design choices on driver size and cost is examined and the array model is used to estimate driver cost savings and performance improvements attainable with aggressive quadrupole array designs with high-performance superconductors.

• Research Organization: Lawrence Livermore National Lab., CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE; USDOE, Washington, DC (United States)
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-48
• OSTI ID: 7285049
• Report Number(s): UCRL-ID-107986; ON: DE92019906
• Resource Relation: Other Information: Thesis (Ph.D.)
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
ICF DEVICES
DESIGN
FINITE ELEMENT METHOD
FIRST WALL
FOCUSING
HEAVY ION FUSION REACTIONS
HYLIFE CONVERTER
INERTIAL CONFINEMENT
LASER FUSION REACTORS
QUADRUPOLES
SUPERCONDUCTING MAGNETS
CONFINEMENT
ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT
ELECTROMAGNETS
EQUIPMENT
MAGNETS
MULTIPOLES
NUCLEAR REACTIONS
NUMERICAL SOLUTION
PLASMA CONFINEMENT
SUPERCONDUCTING DEVICES
THERMONUCLEAR DEVICES
THERMONUCLEAR REACTOR WALLS
THERMONUCLEAR REACTORS
700411* - Inertial Confinement Devices- (1992-)