Recent EAST Experimental Results and Systems Upgrade in Support of Long-Pulse Steady-State Plasma Operation

Yuntao Song,Yaowei Yu,Qing Zang,Bojiang Ding,Yuanlai Xie,Xiuqing Zhang,Long Zeng,Guizong Zuo,Rui Ding,Xianzu Gong,Lili Zhu,Xiaojie Wang,Tianyang Xia,Jinxing Zheng,Guoqiang Zhong,Yong Yang,Zhiwei Zhou,Rong Yan,Zhengchu Wang,Shuai Yuan,Shoubiao Zhang,Yan Cheng,Xiaoyan Liu,Liuwei Xu,Mao Wang,Nong Xiang,Liang Wang,Xinjun Zhang,Huaichuan Hu,Liang Liu,Wendong Ma,Jia Fu,Yue Chen,Fei Guo,Dajun Wu,Mingfu Wang,Haiqing Liu,Yanlan Hu,Jiansheng Hu,Yu Wu,Ran Chen,Guoqiang Li,Tao Zhang,Baonian Wan,Jiangang Li,Biao Shen,Chandong Xu,Jiaxing Li,Xiang Gao,Zhenshan Ji,Yiyun Huang,Fang Ding,Yiping Chen,Liansheng Huang,Bingjia Xiao,Yang Zhang,Bo Lyu,Xiaojiao Chen,Shiyao Lin,Feng Wang,Hailin Zhao,Yadong Li,Xuetian Liu,Youwen Sun,Zhenwei Wu,Bin Zhang,Shi Li,Shiying He,Yinxian Jie,Yahong Xie,Jing Wei,Damao Yao,Junling Chen,Jian Zhang,Shengmin Pan,Wei Song,Qiya Hu ,Yun-Feng Liang ,Q.p Yuan ,Hai Zhu ,Jinping Qian ,Xiang-Song Chen ,Guang–Nan Luo ,Liang Zhao ,Wenhai Xu ,G S Xu ,Hui Zhuang ,J Huang ,Xi Wang ,Fei Liu ,Hsien-Shun Wu ,Kun Lü ,Wu Xin-Chao ,Yanqiang Lei

doi:10.1109/tps.2022.3210124

Abstract

In recent years, EAST has achieved a 60-s scale steady-state plasma operation (SSO), which is electron dominant heated by the electron cyclotron wave and low hybrid wave. Substantial progresses have been made in the development of long-pulse operation, such as active control of radiative divertor, edge localized mode (ELM) suppression, and He plasma experiment. To further develop the steady-state operation scenario and study the related critical physical issues, the upgrade of EAST has been completed in 2020. The auxiliary heating systems were rearranged and upgraded with a total heating power capability of 33 MW. The 2.45-GHz lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) launcher has been updated from full active multijunction (FAM) to passive active multijunction (PAM) to avoid damage caused by plasma–material interaction. The injection power capability of electron cyclotron resonance heating (ECRH) system is upgraded to 1.4 MW. The upgraded ion cyclotron resonance frequency (ICRF) antenna injects low parallel wavenumber ( <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$k_{\vert \vert }$ </tex-math></inline-formula> ) spectra with good single pass absorption. The neutral beam injection (NBI) system is moved from F-port to D-port and is reoriented from counterclockwise to clockwise injection. The armor material of lower divertor has been upgraded from graphite to tungsten improving the steady-state heat handling capability from 2 to 10 MW/m2. Based on the upgraded pumping system and improved conductance, the effective pumping speed for <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$D_{2}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> of the EAST lower divertor increased twice. With all these upgrades, 100-s scale steady-state operation ( <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">$T_{e0} >10$ </tex-math></inline-formula> keV) and 1056-s high-performance operation with 1.73-GJ injection energy were achieved in 2021 campaigns. The experience in high-performance long-pulse operation obtained on EAST will lay a foundation for the ITER and Chinese Fusion Engineering Testing Reactor (CFETR) operation.

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