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Fusion Energy
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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2024 ANS Annual Conference
June 16–19, 2024
Las Vegas, NV|Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino
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The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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Latest News
Commercial nuclear innovation "new space" age
In early 2006, a start-up company launched a small rocket from a tiny island in the Pacific. It exploded, showering the island with debris. A year later, a second launch attempt sent a rocket to space but failed to make orbit, burning up in the atmosphere. Another year brought a third attempt—and a third failure. The following month, in September 2008, the company used the last of its funds to launch a fourth rocket. It reached orbit, making history as the first privately funded liquid-fueled rocket to do so.
Robert Martin, Farrokh Najmabadi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 60 | Number 2 | August 2011 | Pages 793-797
Computational Tools, Modeling & Validation | Proceedings of the Nineteenth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (TOFE) (Part 2) | doi.org/10.13182/FST11-A12482
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Commercial inertial fusion energy power plants will require 5-20Hz fusion target injection rates for utility-scale power production. To mitigate damage from target emission, some designs include a buffer gas in the chamber to reduce heat and particle fluxes to the chamber wall. The evolution of chamber environment between shots is an important issue as residual heat and eddies in the gas pose a serious threat on target survival during injection and target trajectory.We have simulated the evolution of a direct-drive IFE chamber with helium, deuterium, and xenon buffer gases at several densities. To evaluate the link between these simulations and the risk posed to a direct-drive target, we modify an analytical expression of the free-molecular heat flux on a surface element to account for the possibility of chamber gas condensation on the target. We show this expression compares favorably with Monte Carlo simulations in the same gas regime. These results are used to estimate risk for target survival based on several target heating failure modes. Though lower density chamber gas would improve target survival, experimental quantification of several key gas-surface interaction coefficients for cryogenic targets could open the chamber gas design window.