Multi parametric sensitivity study applied to temperature measurement of metallic Plasma Facing Components in fusion devices

Abstract

In nuclear fusion experiments, the protection system of the Plasma Facing Components (PFCs) is commonly ensured by infrared (IR) thermography. Nevertheless, the surface monitoring of new metallic plasma facing component, as in JET and ITER is being challenging. Indeed, the analysis of infrared signals is made more complicated in such a metallic environment since the signals will be perturbed by the reflected photons coming from high temperature regions. To address and anticipate this new measurement environment, predictive photonic models, based on Monte-Carlo ray tracing (SPEOS®CAA V5 Based), have been performed to assess the contribution of the reflective part in the total flux collected by the camera and the resulting temperature error. This paper deals with the effects of metals features, as the emissivity and reflectivity models, on the accuracy of the surface temperature estimation. The reliability of the features models is discussed by comparing the simulation with experimental data obtained with the wide angle IR thermography system of JET-ITER like wall. The impact of the temperature distribution is studied by considering two different typical plasma scenarios, in limiter (ITER start-up scenario) and in X-point configurations (standard divertor scenario). The achievable measurement performances of IR system and risks analysis on its functionalities are discussed.