ELMy H-mode Plasmas Research Articles

ELM-induced arcing on tungsten fuzz in the COMPASS divertor region

Materials exposed to plasma may undergo various forms of surface modifications. Among the important phenomena for tungsten - as the prime candidate plasma-facing material for fusion devices – is a formation of helium-induced fibreform nanostructure, so-called tungsten fuzz.In this paper, we report direct observations of the interaction of the pre-prepared fuzzy tungsten surfaces with ELMy H-mode plasmas in the COMPASS tokamak as well as consequent ex-situ morphological analyses, with a particular focus on arcing as a potential erosion mechanism. Arcing events are documented from high-speed camera imaging. The sample surfaces are examined by scanning electron microscopy.Arc traces were observed on all samples, while their number was dependent on the sample position and orientation. Inside the arc traces, localized melting and densification of the original fuzz was observed, resulting in thickness reduction. The modified structure still retained some porosity and did not extend into the bulk.

Divertor heat flux mitigation by using supersonic molecular beam injection in the HL-2A tokamak

Reduction in the power load deposited onto the divertor target plates is achieved with supersonic molecular beam injection (SMBI) fuelling. The largest reduction in the heat flux profiles occurs at the outboard divertor separatrix strike point, while the heat flux far from the strike point almost keeps constant. Most of this reduction in the divertor heat flux is accompanied by an enhanced plasma radiation. Especially, a partially detached divertor regime is observed with multi-pulse SMBI. Moreover, the divertor heat flux is also mitigated strongly with SMBI in ELMy H-mode plasmas. During this mitigation period, the large-scale fluctuations are suppressed while the small-scale fluctuations increase. These results demonstrate that SMBI technique can be considered as one of the technique tools for mitigating the power load deposited onto the divertor target.

Inter-ELM evolution of the pedestal structures in type-I ELMy H-mode plasmas with LHW and NBI heating on EAST

The evolution characteristics of type-I ELMy high-confinement mode pedestal are examined in EAST based on the recently developed Thomson scattering system. The influence of the plasma current on pedestal evolvement has been confirmed experimentally. In the higher Ip case (500 kA) the pedestal height shows an increase trend until the onset of next ELM and in the lower Ip cases (300 and 400 kA), however, this buildup saturates at the first ∼30% of the ELM cycle. In contrast, the width increases only during the first ∼70% of the ELM cycle and then keeps almost stable in three Ip cases, but resulting in different widening size of ∼1.5, 1 and 0.5 cm for 300, 400 and 500 kA respectively. Experimental results show that the pedestal pressure width has good correlation with poloidal beta as where the fitting coefficient 0.16 is not changed with different plasma currents but a little larger than that of other machines. For each current level, the pedestal density increases while the pedestal temperature decreases. But with increasing platforms, the pedestal height prior to the ELM onset shows a near quadratic (within error bars) increase. Experimental measurements demonstrate that the decrease of with increasing comes mostly from the reduction of the plasma temperature drop, while the pedestal density height keeps relatively stable. Additional injection of LHW has been proved to modify the pedestal structure which should be responsible for the remaining scatter of the experimental data.

Edge localized mode control using n = 1 resonant magnetic perturbation in the EAST tokamak

A set of in-vessel resonant magnetic perturbation (RMP) coil has been recently installed in EAST. It can generate a range of spectrum, and there is a relatively large window for edge localized mode (ELM) control according to the vacuum field modeling of the edge magnetic island overlapping area. Observation of mitigation and suppression of ELM in slow rotating plasmas during the application of an n = 1 RMP is presented in this paper. Strong ELM mitigation effect is observed in neutral beam injection heating plasmas. The ELM frequency increases by a factor of 5, and the crash amplitude and the particle flux are effectively reduced by a similar factor. Clear density pump-out and magnetic braking effects are observed during the application of RMP. Footprint splitting is observed during ELM mitigation and agrees well with vacuum field modelling. Strong ELM mitigation happens after a second sudden drop of plasma density, which indicates the possible effect due to field penetration of the resonant harmonics near the pedestal top, where the electron perpendicular rotation becomes flat and close to zero after the application of RMP. ELM suppression is achieved in a resonant window during the scan of the n = 1 RMP spectrum in radio-frequency (RF) dominant heating plasmas. The best spectrum for ELM suppression is consistent with the resonant peak of RMP by taking into account of linear magnetohydrodynamics plasma response. There is no mode locking during the application of n = 1 RMP in ELMy H-mode plasmas, although the maximal coil current is applied.

Fast measurements of the electron temperature and parallel heat flux in ELMy H-mode on the COMPASS tokamak

We report the latest results on fast measurements of the electron temperature and parallel heat flux in the COMPASS tokamak scrape-off layer (SOL) and divertor region during ELMy H-mode plasmas. The system of ball-pen and Langmuir probes installed on the divertor target, the horizontal reciprocating manipulator and the fast data-acquisition system with sampling frequency rate f = 5 MSa s−1 allow us to measure the electron temperature and parallel heat flux during inter-ELM and ELM periods with high temporal resolution. The filamentary structure of the electron temperature and parallel heat flux was observed during ELMs in the SOL as well as in the divertor region. The position of the filaments within ELMs is not regular and therefore the resulting conditionally averaged ELM neglects the peak values of the electron temperature and parallel heat flux. We have found a substantial difference between the value of the radial power decay length in the inter-ELM period λq,inter = 2.5 mm and the decay length of the peak ELM heat flux λq,ELM = 13.1 mm. The decay length of the ELM energy density was found to be λE,ELM = 5.4 mm.

Impact of ion diamagnetic drift on MHD stability at edge pedestal in JT-60U rotating plasmas

The effect of ion diamagnetic drift on the stability of peeling–ballooning modes in rotating tokamak plasmas has been analyzed numerically. The results show that plasma toroidal rotation can not only destabilize the peeling–ballooning mode but also can reduce the ion diamagnetic drift effect on the mode stability, even though the ion diamagnetic drift effect stabilizes the mode in a static plasma. Plasma poloidal rotation can also destabilize the mode and cancel the ion diamagnetic drift effect, even when the rotation frequency is much smaller than the toroidal one. These impacts of the rotation on the stability can resolve the discrepancy between the result of the numerical stability analysis and the experimental result in type-I ELMy H-mode plasmas in JT-60U. The reduction of the ion diamagnetic drift effect on ELM stability due to plasma rotation is shown to depend on the direction of the rotation, so that the ion diamagnetic drift effect becomes negligible only when the JT-60U plasma rotates in the direction counter to the plasma current.

ELM behaviour and linear MHD stability of edge ECRH heated ASDEX Upgrade plasmas

In order to test the peeling–ballooning ELM model, ECRH heating was applied to the edge of ASDEX Upgrade type-I ELMy H-mode plasmas to alter the pedestal pressure and current density profiles. The discharges were analysed with respect to ideal MHD stability. While the ELM frequency increased and the pedestal gradients relaxed with edge ECRH, the MHD stability boundary did not change. The results indicate that the peeling–ballooning model is insufficient to fully explain the triggering of ELM instabilities in the presence of edge ECRH heating.

The neuroendocrine-immune regulatory network characterized as simple structure but complex function in oyster Crassostrea gigas

The characteristics of the divertor particle and heat fluxes are investigated during ELM bursts in ELMy H-mode plasmas with the lower single null (LSN) configuration in Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR). The particle and heat fluxes are evaluated from the electric probe measurements at the divertor region. It is found that the peak amplitude of the divertor flux during an ELM burst obtained near the outer strike point (OSP) decreases up to about 20% as the ELM frequency increases by a factor of ∼6.5 due to the ELM mitigation and the plasma shaping, which is similar to the trend of the amplitude versus the frequency of the ELM observed in other tokamaks. The ELMs are mitigated by using several methods as magnetic perturbation (MP) field, supersonic molecular beam injection (SMBI) and electron cyclotron heating (ECH) at the edge region. In addition, the particle flux, evaluated at the far scrape-off layer (SOL) region, is less than 1% of the divertor particle flux. In this work, results from the experimental investigations of particle and heat fluxes during ELM bursts from the electric probe measurements at the divertor and far SOL regions are presented.

Maximization of ICRF power by SOL density tailoring with local gas injection

Experiments have been performed under the coordination of the International Tokamak Physics Activity (ITPA) on several tokamaks, including ASDEX Upgrade (AUG), JET and DIII-D, to characterize the increased Ion cyclotron range of frequency (ICRF) antenna loading achieved by optimizing the position of gas injection relative to the RF antennas. On DIII-D, AUG and JET (with the ITER-Like Wall) a 50% increase in the antenna loading was observed when injecting deuterium in ELMy H-mode plasmas using mid-plane inlets close to the powered antennas instead of divertor injection and, with smaller improvement when using gas inlets located at the top of the machine. The gas injection rate required for such improvements (~0.7 × 1022 el s−1 in AUG, ~1.0 × 1022 el s−1 in JET) is compatible with the use of this technique to optimize ICRF heating during the development of plasma scenarios and no degradation of confinement was observed when using the mid-plane or top inlets compared with divertor valves. An increase in the scrape-off layer (SOL) density was measured when switching gas injection from divertor to outer mid-plane or top. On JET and DIII-D, the measured SOL density increase when using main chamber puffing is consistent with the antenna coupling resistance increase provided that the distance between the measurement lines of sight and the injection location is taken into account. Optimized gas injection was also found to be beneficial for reducing tungsten (W) sputtering at the AUG antenna limiters, and also to reduce slightly the W and nickel (Ni) content in JET plasmas. Modeling the specific effects of divertor/top/mid-plane injection on the outer mid-plane density was carried out using both the EDGE2D-EIRENE and EMC3-EIRENE plasma boundary code packages; simulations indeed indicate that outer mid-plane gas injection maximizes the density in the mid-plane close to the injection point with qualitative agreement with the AUG SOL density measurements for EMC3-EIRENE. Field line tracing for ITER in the 15 MA QDT = 10 reference scenario indicates that the planned gas injection system could be used to tailor the density in front the antennas. Benchmarking of EMC3-EIRENE against AUG and JET data is planned as a first step towards the ITER SOL modelling required to quantify the effect of gas injection on the SOL density in front of the antennas.

Study on divertor particle and heat fluxes from electric probe measurements during ELMy H-modes in KSTAR

The characteristics of the divertor particle and heat fluxes are investigated during ELM bursts in ELMy H-mode plasmas with the lower single null (LSN) configuration in Korea Superconducting Tokamak Advanced Research (KSTAR). The particle and heat fluxes are evaluated from the electric probe measurements at the divertor region. It is found that the peak amplitude of the divertor flux during an ELM burst obtained near the outer strike point (OSP) decreases up to about 20% as the ELM frequency increases by a factor of ∼6.5 due to the ELM mitigation and the plasma shaping, which is similar to the trend of the amplitude versus the frequency of the ELM observed in other tokamaks. The ELMs are mitigated by using several methods as magnetic perturbation (MP) field, supersonic molecular beam injection (SMBI) and electron cyclotron heating (ECH) at the edge region. In addition, the particle flux, evaluated at the far scrape-off layer (SOL) region, is less than 1% of the divertor particle flux. In this work, results from the experimental investigations of particle and heat fluxes during ELM bursts from the electric probe measurements at the divertor and far SOL regions are presented.

Determination of tungsten and molybdenum concentrations from an x-ray range spectrum in JET with the ITER-like wall configuration

The and 3p–4d inner shell excitation lines in addition to 2p–3s lines have been identified from the spectrum taken by an upgraded high-resolution x-ray spectrometer. It is found from analysis of the absolute intensities of the and lines that W and Mo concentrations are in the range of and , respectively, with a ratio of ∼5% in JET with the ITER-like wall configuration for ELMy H-mode plasmas with a plasma current of 2.0–2.5 MA, a toroidal magnetic field of 2.7 T and a neutral beam injection power of 14–18 MW. For the purpose of checking self-consistency, it is confirmed that the W concentration determined from the line is in agreement with that from the line within 20% and that the plasma effective charge determined from the continuum of the first order reflection spectrum is also in agreement with that from the second order within 50%. Further, the determined plasma effective charge is in agreement with that determined from a visible spectroscopy, confirming that the sensitivity of the x-ray spectrometer is valid and that the W and the Mo concentrations are also likely to be valid.

Improved confinement in JET high β plasmas with an ITER-like wall

The replacement of the JET carbon wall (C-wall) by a Be/W ITER-like wall (ILW) has affected the plasma energy confinement. To investigate this, experiments have been performed with both the C-wall and ILW to vary the heating power over a wide range for plasmas with different shapes. It was found that the power degradation of thermal energy confinement was weak with the ILW; much weaker than the IPB98(y,2) scaling and resulting in an increase in normalized confinement from H98 ∼ 0.9 at βN ∼ 1.5 to H98 ∼ 1.2−1.3 at βN ∼ 2.5 − 3.0 as the power was increased (where H98 = τE/τIPB98(y,2) and βN = βTBT/aIP in % T/mMA). This reproduces the general trend in JET of higher normalized confinement in the so-called ‘hybrid’ domain, where normalized β is typically above 2.5, compared with ‘baseline’ ELMy H-mode plasmas with βN ∼ 1.5 − 2.0. This weak power degradation of confinement, which was also seen with the C-wall experiments at low triangularity, is due to both increased edge pedestal pressure and core pressure peaking at high power. By contrast, the high triangularity C-wall plasmas exhibited elevated H98 over a wide power range with strong, IPB98(y,2)-like, power degradation. This strong power degradation of confinement appears to be linked to an increase in the source of neutral particles from the wall as the power increased, an effect that was not reproduced with the ILW. The reason for the loss of improved confinement domain at low power with the ILW is yet to be clarified, but contributing factors may include changes in the rate of gas injection, wall recycling, plasma composition and radiation. The results presented in this paper show that the choice of wall materials can strongly affect plasma performance, even changing confinement scalings that are relied upon for extrapolation to future devices.

H-mode filament studies with reflectometry in ASDEX upgrade

Broadband swept (i.e. frequency modulation of the continuous wave; FM-CW) and fixed frequency reflectometry (FFR) were used for the first time to study plasma filamentary activity; experiments were performed in ELMy H-mode plasmas at the ASDEX Upgrade tokamak. Electron density profiles were studied with FM-CW providing a first insight into filamentary activity and enabling us to localize the density layers probed with FFR. A novel filament detection technique was developed using a threshold criterion on the phase derivative signals from FFR. This technique was applied together with conditional averaging in measurements performed in the vicinity of the separatrix. Results showed good agreement with data from Langmuir probes and it was found that the majority of filaments propagate with dominant poloidal velocity in both periods of in-between edge localized modes (ELMs) (Vθ ≈ 575 m s−1) and at the ELM onset (Vθ ≈ 1180 m s−1). A time delay between the maximum filament activity at the outer mid-plane and the ELM peak at the inner divertor currents (≈ −461 ± 50 μs) agrees with expected time scales for the ELM lifetime. In inter-ELM periods we were able to estimate typical poloidal and toroidal sizes of filaments (Sθ ≈ [5.75–11.50] cm and Sϕ ≈ [33–66] cm) and a magnetohydrodynamic mode structure emerged from the measurements with poloidal and toroidal mode numbers (m ≈ [8–12] and n ≈ [2, 3]) in the range of possible peeling-ballooning modes.

Interpretation of radiative divertor studies with impurity seeding in type-I ELMy H-mode plasmas in JET-ILW using EDGE2D–EIRENE

Nitrogen seeded JET-ILW H-mode plasmas have been investigated with EDGE2D–EIRENE. The simulations reproduce the experimentally observed factor of 10 reduction in the outer target power deposition when the normalized divertor radiation, Praddiv/PSOL, increases from the unseeded levels of 15% up to the 50% levels required for detachment. At these radiation levels, nitrogen is predicted dominate the total radiation with a contribution of 85%, consistent with previous measurements in JET-C. Due to the low radiative potential of nitrogen at the electron temperatures above 100eV, more than 80% of the radiation is predicted to occur in the scrape-off layer, making nitrogen a suitable divertor radiator for typical JET divertor conditions with Te around 30eV. The simulations reproduce the experimentally observed particle flux reduction at the low-field side target without the need for strong recombination. This is due to strong impurity radiation reducing the power levels entering the deuterium ionization front.

Energy deposition onto HL-2A divertor plates in ELMy H-mode discharges using infrared thermography

Using infrared (IR) thermography, power loads onto the divertor plates have been investigated in ELMy H-mode plasmas on HL-2A. In the ELMy H-mode discharges, ELMs are the largest contributors to the divertor target energy load. Analysis of energy balance shows that up to 45% of the energy losses are deposited onto the divertor targets during ELMs and about 30% are found as plasma radiation. Moreover, divertor heat flux mitigation has been achieved during an ELMy H-mode phase by using Supersonic Molecular Beam Injection (SMBI), characterized by a sharp increase of ELM frequency and a reduction in peak heat flux. The increased plasma radiation energy losses, especially the doubled plasma radiation in the divertor region, should be responsible for the reduction of integrated energy deposition onto divertor targets.

Global and pedestal confinement in JET with a Be/W metallic wall

Type I ELMy H-mode operation in JET with the ITER-like Be/W wall (JET-ILW) generally occurs at lower pedestal pressures compared to those with the full carbon wall (JET-C). The pedestal density is similar but the pedestal temperature where type I ELMs occur is reduced and below to the so-called critical type I–type III transition temperature reported in JET-C experiments. Furthermore, the confinement factor H98(y,2) in type I ELMy H-mode baseline plasmas is generally lower in JET-ILW compared to JET-C at low power fractions Ploss/Pthr,08 < 2 (where Ploss is (Pin − dW/dt), and Pthr,08 the L–H power threshold from Martin et al 2008 (J. Phys. Conf. Ser. 123 012033)). Higher power fractions have thus far not been achieved in the baseline plasmas. At Ploss/Pthr,08 > 2, the confinement in JET-ILW hybrid plasmas is similar to that in JET-C. A reduction in pedestal pressure is the main reason for the reduced confinement in JET-ILW baseline ELMy H-mode plasmas where typically H98(y,2) = 0.8 is obtained, compared to H98(y,2) = 1.0 in JET-C. In JET-ILW hybrid plasmas a similarly reduced pedestal pressure is compensated by an increased peaking of the core pressure profile resulting in H98(y,2) ⩽ 1.25. The pedestal stability has significantly changed in high triangularity baseline plasmas where the confinement loss is also most apparent. Applying the same stability analysis for JET-C and JET-ILW, the measured pedestal in JET-ILW is stable with respect to the calculated peeling–ballooning stability limit and the ELM collapse time has increased to 2 ms from typically 200 µs in JET-C. This indicates that changes in the pedestal stability may have contributed to the reduced pedestal confinement in JET-ILW plasmas. A comparison of EPED1 pedestal pressure prediction with JET-ILW experimental data in over 500 JET-C and JET-ILW baseline and hybrid plasmas shows a good agreement with 0.8 < (measured pped)/(predicted pped,EPED) < 1.2, but that the role of triangularity is generally weaker in the JET-ILW experimental data than in the model predictions.

Reduction of ELM energy loss by pellet injection for ELM pacing

The energy loss caused by the edge-localized mode (ELM) needs to be reduced for ITER operations with ELMy H-mode plasmas. The reduction in ELM energy loss by pellet injection for ELM pacing is studied by an integrated core/scrape-off layer/divertor transport code TOPICS-IB with a magnetohydrodynamic stability code and a pellet model taking account of the E × B drift of the pellet plasma cloud. It is found that the energy loss can be significantly reduced by a pellet injected to the pedestal plasma equivalent to that at the middle timing in the natural ELM cycle, whose pressure height is only about 5% lower than that of the natural ELM onset. In this case, pellet injection from the low-field side enables a small pellet, with about 1–2% of pedestal particle content and a speed high enough to approach the pedestal top, to reduce the energy loss significantly. With the above suitable conditions for ELM pacing, a pellet penetrates deep into the pedestal and triggers high-n ballooning modes with localized eigenfunctions near the pedestal top, where n is the toroidal mode number. Under suitable conditions, ELM pacing with reduced energy loss is successfully demonstrated in simulations, in which the gas puff reduction and the enhancement of divertor pumping can compensate for the core density increase due to additional particle fuelling by the pacing pellet.

Impact of nitrogen seeding on confinement and power load control of a high-triangularity JET ELMy H-mode plasma with a metal wall

This paper reports the impact on confinement and power load of the high-shape 2.5 MA ELMy H-mode scenario at JET of a change from all carbon plasma-facing components to an all metal wall. In preparation to this change, systematic studies of power load reduction and impact on confinement as a result of fuelling in combination with nitrogen seeding were carried out in JET-C and are compared with their counterpart in JET with a metallic wall. An unexpected and significant change is reported on the decrease in the pedestal confinement but is partially recovered with the injection of nitrogen.

Fuel retention studies with the ITER-Like Wall in JET

JET underwent a transformation from a full carbon-dominated tokamak to a fully metallic device with beryllium in the main chamber and a tungsten divertor. This material combination is foreseen for the activated phase of ITER. The ITER-Like Wall (ILW) experiment at JET shall demonstrate the plasma compatibility with metallic walls and the reduction in fuel retention. We report on a set of experiments (Ip = 2.0 MA, Bt = 2.0–2.4 T, δ = 0.2–0.4) in different confinement and plasma conditions with global gas balance analysis demonstrating a strong reduction in the long-term retention rate by more than a factor of 10 with respect to carbon-wall reference discharges. All experiments are executed in a series of identical plasma discharges in order to achieve maximum plasma duration until the analysis limit of the active gas handling system is reached. The composition analysis shows high purity of the recovered gas, typically 99% D. For typical L-mode discharges (Paux = 0.5 MW), type III (Paux = 5.0 MW) and type-I ELMy H-mode plasmas (Paux = 12.0 MW) a drop of the deuterium retention rate normalized to the operational time in divertor configuration is measured from 1.27 × 1021, 1.37 × 1021 and 1.97 × 1021 D s−1 down to 4.8 × 1019, 7.2 × 1019 and 16 × 1019 D s−1, respectively. The dynamic retention increases in the limiter phase in comparison with carbon-fibre composite, but also the outgassing after the discharge has risen in the same manner and overcompensates this transient retention. Overall an upper limit of the long-term retention rate of 1.5 × 1020 D s−1 is obtained with the ILW. The observed reduction by one order of magnitude confirms the expected predictions concerning the plasma-facing material change in ITER and is in line with identification of fuel co-deposition with Be as the main mechanism for the residual long-term retention. The reduction widens the operational space without active cleaning in the DT phase in comparison with a full carbon device.

Divertor heat flux mitigation using Supersonic Molecular Beam Injection in type-III ELMy H mode plasmas of HL-2A tokamak

Abstract Divertor heat flux mitigation has been achieved using the Supersonic Molecular Beam Injection (SMBI) in type-III ELMy H-mode plasmas on the HL-2A tokamak. After an SMBI, ELM mitigation occurs and is characterized by an ELM frequency increase by a factor of 2–3 and an amplitude decrease by 30–40%. The corresponding confinement has a little degradation (stored energy drops is smaller than 7%). The burst rate of smaller-scale filament (density amplitude σ ) increases by 20–30%, and the divertor heat flux decreases by 40–50%, which is consistent with an increase in radiation power loss. This observation indicates that SMBI should be a good candidate for ELM mitigation.