Estimation of Impurity Burning due to MeV-Region Neutral Beam Injection

Abstract

Decrement of the α heating power and radiation loss due to light impurities are compared with the fusion power of the high-energy deuterium and light impurity reaction. The high-energy deuterium ions in a plasma are produced by MeV-region neutral beam injection. Lithium and beryllium are selected as the light impurities. The calculated results show that the Li fusion power exceeds the decrement of α-particle heating power under the low density condition of international thermonuclear experimental reactor (ITER) class plasma; however, under the high-density condition the Li fusion power is less than the bremsstrahlung power. Therefore, the burning of Li impurities due to the MeV neutral beam will affect the energy balance under only the low-density condition.