Radial impurity flux measuring method with plasma heating in general geometry

Abstract

Devising a means to measure the radial impurity flux across the pedestal could be used to reduce impurity accumulation, if not prevent it while providing natural fueling, and thus improving fusion performance in tokamaks. We employ a novel solution procedure that takes advantage of the poloidal flow measurement to obtain the radial impurity flux directly from available diagnostics, such as charge exchange recombination spectroscopy and Thomson scattering. In the absence of our procedure, a computationally demanding kinetic calculation of the full bulk ion response would be required at finite aspect ratio for the flux surface shape of interest. The more general form of the model considered here permits large toroidal impurity flow on the order of the impurity thermal speed. Moreover, it allows plasma heating techniques to be employed to actively modify the poloidal variation of the potential to adjust the location of impurity accumulation and thereby alter the radial impurity flux.