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Fusion energy: Progress, partnerships, and the path to deployment
Over the past decade, fusion energy has moved decisively from scientific aspiration toward a credible pathway to a new energy technology. Thanks to long-term federal support, we have significantly advanced our fundamental understanding of plasma physics—the behavior of the superheated gases at the heart of fusion devices. This knowledge will enable the creation and control of fusion fuel under conditions required for future power plants. Our progress is exemplified by breakthroughs at the National Ignition Facility and the Joint European Torus.
Gianmaria De Tommasi, Raffaele Albanese, Giuseppe Ambrosino, Marco Ariola, Peter J. Lomas, Alfredo Pironti, Filippo Sartori, JET-EFDA Contributors
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 59 | Number 3 | April 2011 | Pages 486-498
Lecture | Fourth ITER International Summer School (IISS2010) | doi.org/10.13182/FST59-486
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The need to achieve increasingly better performance in present and future tokamak devices has made plasma control increasingly important in tokamak engineering. When high performance and robustness are required, it is essential to adopt a model-based approach to design a control system. We introduce the basics of plasma current, position, and shape control in tokamaks. As an example, the plasma magnetic control systems of the JET tokamak is presented, together with an approach proposed for plasma axisymmetric magnetic control at the ITER tokamak.