Progress in tritium retention and release modeling for ceramic breeders

Abstract

Abstract Tritium behavior in ceramic breeder blankets is a key design issue for this class of blanket because of its impact on safety and fuel self-sufficiency. Over the past 10–15 years, substantial theoretical and experimental effort has been dedicated worldwide to the development of a better understanding of tritium transport in ceramic breeders. The models available today seem to cover reasonably well all of the key physical transport and trapping mechanisms. They allow for reasonable interpretation and reproduction of experimental data, help to point out deficiencies in the material property database, provide guidance for future experiments and aid in the analysis of blanket tritium behavior. This paper highlights the progress in tritium modeling over the last decade. Key tritium transport mechanisms are briefly described, together with the more recent, sophisticated models which have been developed to help understand them. Recent experimental data are highlighted and model calibration and validation are discussed. Finally, example applications to blanket cases are shown as an illustration of the progress in the prediction of ceramic breeder blanket tritium inventory.