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RIC panel discusses pathway to fusion commercialization
Fusion leaders at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s annual Regulatory Information Conference discussed the path forward for regulating the burgeoning fusion industry. The speakers discussed government and private industry initiatives in the United States and United Kingdom, with a focus on efforts shaping the near-term deployment of commercial fusion machines.
A recurring theme was the need to explain the difference between fission and fusion. Representatives from the Department of Energy and Type One Energy highlighted this as an important distinction for regulators, as it will allow fusion to undergo its own independent maturation process for developing standards and regulations in the same way that fission has. Lea Perlas, Fusion Program director at the Virginia Department of Health, said that confusion between fission and fusion has been a common cause for misplaced concerns among community members surrounding Commonwealth Fusion Systems’ proposed fusion plant site near Richmond, Va.
J. A. Schmidt, C. A. Flanagan
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 56-61
U.S. Next-Generation Tokamak and Tandem Mirror Programs | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A22845
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Design studies on a superconducting, long-pulse, current-driven, ignited tokamak, called the Toroidal Fusion Core Demonstration (TFCD), are being conducted by the Fusion Engineering Design Center (FEDC) and Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) with additional broad community involvement. Options include the use of all-superconducting toroidal field (TF) coils, a superconducting-copper hybrid arrangement of TF coils, or all-copper TF coils. Only the first two options have been considered to date. The general feasibility of these approaches has been established with the goal of high performance (ignition, ∼390 MW; wall loading ∼2.2 MW/m2) at minimum capital cost. The preconceptual effort will be completed in early FY 1984 and a selection made from the indicated options. The TFCD is judged to represent a reasonable necessary step between the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor (TFTR) and the Engineering Test Reactor (ETR).