Conceptual design and testing strategy of a dual functional lithium–lead test blanket module in ITER and EAST

Abstract

A dual functional lithium–lead (DFLL) test blanket module (TBM) concept has been proposed for testing in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) and the Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) in China to demonstrate the technologies of the liquid lithium–lead breeder blankets with emphasis on the balance between the risks and the potential attractiveness of blanket technology development. The design of DFLL-TBM concept has the flexibility of testing both the helium-cooled quasi-static lithium–lead (SLL) blanket concept and the He/PbLi dual-cooled lithium–lead (DLL) blanket concept. This paper presents an effective testing strategy proposed to achieve the testing target of SLL and DLL DEMO blankets relevant conditions, which includes three parts: materials R&D and small-scale out-of-pile mockups testing in loops, middle-scale TBMs pre-testing in EAST and full-scale consecutive TBMs testing corresponding to different operation phases of ITER during the first 10 years. The design of the DFLL-TBM concept and the testing strategy ability to test TBMs for both blanket concepts in sequence and or in parallel for both ITER and EAST are discussed.