1,721,092 research outputs found
Design of a water cooled monoblock divertor for DEMO using Eurofer as structural material
No full textThe performed investigation focus on a monoblock type design for a water cooled DEMO divertor using Eurofer as structural material. In 2013, a study case of such a concept was presented. It was shown that basic concepts using Eurofer as structural material are limited to an incident heat flux of 8 MW m -2. Since, the EFDA agency issued new specifications. In this study, the conceptual design is reassessed with regard to specifications. Then, steady state thermal analyses and thermo-mechanical elastic analyses have been performed to define an upgrade of the geometry taking into account new specifications, design criteria and the maximum heat flux requirement of 10 MW m-2. An analysis of the influence of each adjustable geometrical parameter on thermo-mechanical design criteria was performed. As a consequence, geometrical parameters were set in order to fit to materials requirements. For defined hydraulic conditions taken in the most favourable configuration, the limit of this design is estimated to an incident heat flux of 10 MW m -2. Margin to critical heat flux and rules against progressive deformation/ratcheting in structural material limit the design. © 2014 Elsevier B.V
Potential and limits of water cooled divertor concepts based on monoblock design as possible candidates for a DEMO reactor
No full textIn this paper water-cooled divertor concepts based on tungsten monoblock design identified in previous studies as candidate for fusion power plant have been reviewed to assess their potential and limits as possible candidates for a DEMO concept deliverable in a short to medium term ("conservative baseline design"). The rationale and technology development assumptions that have led to their selection are revisited taking into account present factual information on reactor parameters, materials properties and manufacturing technologies. For that purpose, main parameters impacting the divertor design are identified and their relevance discussed. The state of the art knowledge on materials and relevant manufacturing techniques is reviewed. Particular attention is paid to material properties change after irradiation; phenomenon thresholds (if any) and possible operating ranges are identified (in terms of temperature and damage dose). The suitability of various proposed heat sink/structural and sacrificial layer materials, as proposed in the past, are re-assessed (e.g. with regard to the possibility of reducing peak heat flux and/or neutron radiation damages). As a result, potential and limits of various proposed concepts are highlighted, ranges in which they could operate (if any) defined and possible improvements are proposed. Identified missing point in materials database and/or manufacturing techniques knowledge that should be uppermost investigated in future R&D activities are reported. This work has been carried out in the frame of EFDA PPPT Work Programme activities. © 2013 Elsevier B.V
The development and testing of the thermal break divertor monoblock target design delivering 20MWm-2 heat load capability
No full textThe design and development of a novel plasma facing component (for fusion power plants) is described. The component uses the existing 'monoblock' construction which consists of a tungsten 'block' joined via a copper interlayer to a through CuCrZr cooling pipe. In the new concept the interlayer stiffness and conductivity properties are tuned so that stress in the principal structural element of the component (the cooling pipe) is reduced. Following initial trials with off-the-shelf materials, the concept was realized by machined features in an otherwise solid copper interlayer. The shape and distribution of the features were tuned by finite element analyses subject to ITER structural design criterion in-vessel components (SDC-IC) design rules. Proof of concept mock-ups were manufactured using a two stage brazing process verified by tomography and micrographic inspection. Full assemblies were inspected using ultrasound and thermographic (SATIR) test methods at ENEA and CEA respectively. High heat flux tests using IPP's GLADIS facility showed that 200 cycles at 20MWm-2 and five cycles at 25MWm-2 could be sustained without apparent component damage. Further testing and component development is planned. © 2017 Culham Centre for Fusion Energy
Quantitative thermal imperfection definition using non-destructive infrared thermography on an advanced DEMO divertor concept
No full textThe future DEMO divertor is currently under conceptual design within the European Consortium. In this regard, several concepts have been proposed and mock-ups have been fabricated to investigate their thermo-mechanical behaviour. Indeed, as a key plasma facing component, the divertor will have to withstand extreme thermal loads (up to 20 MW m-2 during slow transient events) and will have to be able to exhaust a large amount of heat. The presence of structural defects in the component may significantly affect the thermal response and must therefore be considered. A non-destructive technique based on infrared thermography is proposed here to detect defects in mock-ups where graded material was used as an interlayer between the heatsink material and the armor material. Two methods to characterize the size and location of such defects are presented. It was shown that finite element analysis combined with experimental data from infrared thermography, provides accurate means to assess quantitatively the size and position of thermal imperfections. © 2017 Franklin Gallay
Design study of ITER-like divertor target for DEMO
No full textA near-term water-cooled target solution has to be evaluated together with the required technologies and its power exhaust limit under 'DEMO' conditions. The ITER-like design concept based on the mono-block technology using W as armour material and the CuCrZr-IG as structural material with an interlayer of pure copper represents a promising solution also for DEMO. This work reports the design study of an "optimized" ITER-like Water Cooled Divertor able to withstand a heat flux of 10 MW m-2, as requested for DEMO operating conditions. The optimization of plasma facing unit (PFU) aims to enhance the thermo-mechanical behaviour of the component by varying some geometrical parameters (monoblock size, interlayer thickness and, tube diameter and thickness). The optimization was performed by means of the multi-variable optimization algorithms using the FEM code ANSYS. The coolant hydraulic conditions (inlet pressure, temperature and velocity) were fixed for simplicity. This study is based on elastic analysis and 3 dimensional modelling. The resulting optimized geometry was evaluated on the basis of the ITER SDC-IC criteria and in terms of low cycle fatigue (LCF). The margin to the critical heat flux (CHF) was also estimated. Further design study (taking into account the effect of neutron radiation on the material properties) together with mock-up fabrication and high-heat-flux (HHF) tests are foreseen in next work programmes. © 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved
European divertor target concepts for DEMO: Design rationales and high heat flux performance
No full textThe divertor target plates are the most thermally loaded in-vessel components in a fusion reactor where high heat fluxes are produced on the plasma-facing components (PFCs) by intense plasma bombardment, radiation and nuclear heating. For reliable exhaust of huge thermal power, robust and durable divertor target PFCs with a sufficiently large heat removal capability and lifetime has to be developed. Since 2014 in the framework of the preconceptual design activities of the EUROfusion DEMO project, integrated R&D efforts have been made in the subproject ‘Target development’ of the work package ‘Divertor’ to develop divertor target PFCs for DEMO. Recently, the first R&D phase was concluded where six (partly novel) target PFC concepts were developed and evaluated by means of non-destructive inspections and high-heat-flux fatigue testing. In this paper, the major achievements of the first phase activities in this subproject are presented focusing on the design rationales of the target PFC concepts, technology options employed for small-scale mock-up fabrication and the results of the first round high-heat-flux qualification test campaign. It is reported that the mock-ups of three PFC concepts survived up to 500 loading cycles at 20 MW/m2 (with hot water cooling at 130 °C) without any discernable indication of degradation in performance or structural integrity. © 201
Technological review of the HRP manufacturing process R&D activity
No full textENEA and Ansaldo Nucleare S.p.A. have been deeply involved in the European International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) R&D activities for the manufacturing of high heat flux plasma-facing components (HHFC), and in particular for the inner vertical target (IVT) of the ITER divertor. This component has to be manufactured by using both armour and structural materials whose properties are defined by ITER. Their physical properties prevent the use of standard joining techniques. The reference armour materials are tungsten and carbon/carbon fibre composite (CFC). The cooling pipe is made of copper alloy (CuCrZr-IG). During the last years ENEA and Ansaldo have jointly manufactured several actively cooled monoblock mock-ups and prototypical components of different length, geometry and materials, by using innovative processes: HRP (hot radial pressing) and PBC (pre-brazed casting). The history of the technical issues solved during the R&D phase and the improvements implemented to the assembling tools and equipments are reviewed in the paper together with the testing results. The optimization of the processes started from the successful manufacturing of both W and CFC armoured small scale mockups thermal fatigue tested in the worst ITER operating condition (20 MW/m2) through the achievement of record performances obtained from a monoblock medium scale mockup. On the base of these results ENEA-ANSALDO participated to the European programme for the qualification of the manufacturing technology to be used for the procurement of the ITER divertor IVT, according to the F4E specifications. A divertor inner vertical target prototype (400 mm total length) with three plasma facing component units, was successfully tested at ITER relevant thermal heat fluxes. Now, ANSALDO and ENEA are ready to face the challenge of the ITER inner vertical target production, transferring to an industrial production line the experience gained in the development, optimization and qualification of the PBC and HRP processes. © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved
Modeling of long term effects on plasma facing components for a fusion power reactor
No full textIn a fusion power reactor the Plasma Facing Components (PFC) will experience a thermal and neutron irradiation induced creep together with tensile properties degradation and swelling due to neutron irradiation. So the investigation of the long term creep effects on the materials used for the PFC's in a fusion power plant are of vital importance for the design and safe operation of the device. On the other hand the creep behavior study for a given material requires long and expensive test campaigns, repeated on specimens at different levels of neutron irradiation, because of the material parameters variation due to the cumulated irradiation. In this work we want to investigate if the numerical mechanical simulations employment, according to a proper methodology, could reduce the number of needed creep tests, because this would be a valuable help in defining suitable materials and valid conceptual designs for PFC's. For this reason a method based on the systematic variation of the parameters of the empirical law, e.g. the Norton-Bailey, is outlined. To exemplify it, the behavior of a simplified model is analyzed under thermal and mechanical cyclic loading in a time transient elasto-plastic simulation, including the creep behavior, varying the parameters in the empirical creep law for the material
Comparison between FEM and high heat flux thermal fatigue testing results of ITER divertor plasma facing mock-ups
No full textThe divertor is one of the most challenging components of "DEMO" the next step ITER machine, so many tasks regarding modeling and experiments have been made in the past years to assess manufacturing processes, materials and thus the life-time of the components. In this context the finite element analysis (FEA) allows designers to explore multiple design options, to reduce physical prototypes and to optimize design performance. The comparison between the hydraulic thermal-mechanical analysis performed by ANSYS WORKBENCH 14.5 and the test results [1] on small-scale mock-ups manufactured with the Hot Radial Pressing (HRP) [2] technology is presented in this paper. During the thermal fatigue testing in the Efremov TSEFEY facility to assess the heat flux load-carrying capability of the mock-ups, only the surface temperature was measured, so the FEA was important because it allowed to know any other information (temperature inside the materials, local water temperature, local stress, etc.). FEA was performed coupling the thermal-hydraulic analysis, that calculated the temperature distributions on the components and the heat transfer coefficient (HTC) between water and heat sink tube, with the mechanical analysis. The comparison between analysis and testing results was based on the temperature maps of the loaded surface and on number of the cycles supported during the testing and those predicted by the mechanical analysis using the experimental fatigue curves for CuCrZr-IG, that is the structural material in the component. Also the behavior for Cu-OFHC interlayer material based on the experimental fatigue curves was considered and the ultimate tensile strength for W, because their failure affects the heat removal capability of the component. The good correlation found between FEA results and testing campaign validated again the use of FEA itself for future design improved concepts. © 2014 EURATOM-ENEA Association
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