Analysis of the energy transport and deposition within the reaction chamber of the prometheus inertial fusion energy reactor

Conference · Sat Dec 31 04:00:00 EST 1994

OSTI ID:197085

Eggleston, J E; Abdou, M A; Tillack, M S ^[1]

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1. Univ. of California, Los Angeles, CA (United States)

One of the parameters affecting the feasibility of Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) devices is the number of shots per unit time, i.e. the repetition rate. The repetition rate limits the achievable power that can be obtained from the reactor. To obtain an estimate of the allowable time between shots, a code named RECON was developed to model the response of the reaction chamber to the pellet explosion. This paper discusses how the code treats the thermodynamic response of the cavity gas and models the condensation/evaporation of this vapor to and from the first wall. A large amount of energy from the pellet microexplosion is carried by the pellet debris and the x-rays generated in the fusion reaction. Models of x-ray attenuation and ion slowing down are used to estimate the fraction of the pellet energy that is absorbed in the vapor. A large amount of energy is absorbed into the cavity gas, which causes it to become partially ionized. The ionization complicates the calculation of the temperature, pressure, and the radiative heat transfer from the gas to the first wall. To treat this problem, methods developed by Zel`dovich and Raizer are used in modeling the internal energy and the radiative heat flux. RECON was developed to run with a relatively short computational time, yet accurate enough for conceptual reactor design calculations.

• OSTI ID: 197085
• Report Number(s): CONF-940664--
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY
ENERGY DEPOSITION
ENERGY TRANSFER
ICF DEVICES
INERTIAL CONFINEMENT
R CODES