Abstract
Within the framework of the EUROfusion research and development activities, the Water-Cooled Lithium Lead (WCLL) Breeding Blanket (BB) is one of the two candidates to be chosen as the driver blanket for the European DEMO nuclear fusion reactor. Hence, an intense research work is currently ongoing throughout the EU to develop a robust conceptual design able to fulfil the design requirements selected at the end of the DEMO pre-conceptual design phase. In this work, the thermo-mechanical analysis and the design update of the top cap (TC) region of the DEMO WCLL Central Out-board Blanket (COB) segment is presented. The scope of the work is to find a design solution of the WCLL COB TC region able to fulfil the design requirements, prescribed by the reference RCC-MRx code, under the selected nominal and accidental steady state loading scenarios. The activity herein presented moved from the WCLL COB reference design, purposely modified in compliance with the adopted thermal and mechanical requirements in order to attain a robust TC region geometric layout. In the end, a geometric configuration called “TC region-mod++” was determined, foreseeing a TC able to safely withstand both nominal and accidental loads. Nevertheless, some criticalities still hold in the internal stiffening plates and, therefore, further and finer analysis are necessary to fully match the goal. In any case, it was also found that the proposed approach for the design update is promising and worthy to be further pursued. The work was performed following a theoretical–numerical approach based on the finite element method (FEM) and adopting the quoted Ansys commercial FEM code.
Highlights
The production of electricity from D-T nuclear fusion reactions is one of the biggest endeavors faced by the international scientific community
This simple observation allows demonstrating that the followed design improvement strategy is promising, and it is worthy to be pursued as a follow up of the research activity presented
Within the framework of EUROfusion activities, an intense research campaign is ongoing to attain a robust design for the Water-Cooled Lithium Lead (WCLL) Central Out-board Blanket (COB) segment
Summary
The production of electricity from D-T nuclear fusion reactions is one of the biggest endeavors faced by the international scientific community In this regard, the design of the DEMO reactor will surely represent an important milestone. The BB is the key component of a large size fusion reactor, as it is devoted to produce T, ensuring plant self-sustenance, and to convey the fusion energy toward its final conversion into electricity In this regard, the Water-Cooled Lithium Lead (WCLL) BB is one of the two candidate concepts currently poised to be chosen, at the end of the present conceptual design phase, as the driver blanket for the EU DEMO conceptual design. The obtained results are presented and critically discussed, highlighting the open issues and paving the way for the follow up of this research line
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