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This division promotes the development and timely introduction of fusion energy as a sustainable energy source with favorable economic, environmental, and safety attributes. The division cooperates with other organizations on common issues of multidisciplinary fusion science and technology, conducts professional meetings, and disseminates technical information in support of these goals. Members focus on the assessment and resolution of critical developmental issues for practical fusion energy applications.
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Fusion Science and Technology
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Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
J. G. Murray/K. E. Rothe, George Bronner
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 1486-1490
Power Conversion, Instrumentation, and Control | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A23066
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The energy loss in a torus vessel during startup is now an important factor in a power-producing tokamak design. The torus design cannot be based on a system which minimizes the conductivity with resistive structures as in present experimental devices. If the resistivity of the torus is too high, the reactors are subject to damage from an uncontrolled fast shutdown such as a disruption. The thermal and magnetic stored energy due to the plasma current loop is several hundred megajoules, which can produce melting of the torus wall. To prevent excessive damage, a low resistance passive circuit must be provided close to the plasma edge. Another desirable design feature is to make all vacuum seals as far away from the plasma as practical. Thus, the reactor torus designs need an inner low resistance shell and an outer high resistance shell. In addition, the superconducting dewar and coil support structures provide paths for toroidal currents to flow. The calculations provided in this paper can be used to determine the size and cost of the systems as a function of the resistances of the structures. The results can thus be used to guide the preliminary concepts for the electromagnetic characteristics of a tokamak.