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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.
T. C. Geer, T. A. Parish
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 161-166
Hybrids and Nonelectric Applications | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A22861
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Fissile fuel producing blankets for both D-D and D-T fusion reactors are designed based on a slurry concept. In the designs, the blanket is composed of a slurry of ThO2 particles carried by heavy water. The slurry serves both to cool the reactor and to breed fissile fuel. Neutronic and photonic calculations showed that the slurry blankets achieved performance comparable to alternative concepts (moltensalts, fixed fertile material). For the slurry concept to be useful for a D-T reactor, a neutron multiplier needed to be used. The fast fission rate in the slurry blankets was small. Fission of the bred fissile material can be limited by removal of the ThO2 particles for processing after 5–10 days of irradiation.