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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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Russia withdraws from 25-year-old weapons-grade plutonium agreement
Russia’s lower house of Parliament, the State Duma, approved a measure to withdraw from a 25-year-old agreement with the United States to cut back on the leftover plutonium from Cold War–era nuclear weapons.
John H. Pitts
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 4 | Number 2 | September 1983 | Pages 967-972
Inertial Confinement Fusion | doi.org/10.13182/FST83-A22984
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The Cascade concept uses the high-temperature (1200 K) potential of a solid Li2O pebble blanket in conjunction with centrifugal action to produce a safe and highly efficient (up to 55%) reaction chamber for commercial power production. One option using a 25-mm-thick steel wall is shown to have low primary stresses of 22 MPa, which when coupled with a secondary thermal stress of 132 MPa, satisfies the intent and methodology for an ASME-designed vessel. A high tritium breeding ratio of 1.35 results from direct exposure of the Li2O blanket to the fusion reactions. Vacuum pumping requirements of the chamber, using laser drivers at a pressure of 0.1 Torr, are a modest 4.7 m3/s for D-T and 3.1 m3/s for helium. Carbon-14 activation in the blanket is insignificant. We conclude that the Cascade concept offers an attractive option for a safe and efficient inertial fusion reaction chamber.