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September 8–11, 2025
Atlanta, GA|Atlanta Marriott Marquis
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Deep geologic repository progress—2025 Update
Editor's note: This article has was originally published in November 2023. It has been updated with new information as of June 2025.
Outside my office, there is a display case filled with rock samples from all over the world. It contains a disk of translucent, orange salt from the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.; a core of white-and-bronze gneiss from the site of the future deep geologic repository in Eurajoki, Finland; several angular chunks of fine-grained, gray claystone from the underground research laboratory at Bure, France; and a piece of coarse-grained granite from the underground research tunnel in Daejeon, South Korea.
W. D. Booth, G. W. Branson, R. Carrera, G. Hallock, S. S. Medley, M. E. Oakes, C. A. Ordonez,† T. A. Parish,‡ R. L. Sledge, W. A. Walls, W. F. Weldon, M. D. Werst
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 19 | Number 3 | May 1991 | Pages 1143-1148
Ignition Device | doi.org/10.13182/FST91-A29497
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The basic fusion ignition experiment IGNITEX can achieve plasma ignition through the use of high toroidal fields (20 T) and ohmic heating. The experiment will operate in a pulsed tokamak mode with one discharge every two hours. The single-turn-coil system will be driven by homopolar generators and will be cooled by a liquid nitrogen bath. The experimental program will stretch over a three year period with the first D-T fueled discharges taking place after about 19 months of operation. Hands-on maintenance is possible both inside and outside the primary shielding due to the low activation levels of the experiment. This low activation is because of the almost complete coverage of the vacuum vessel by the thick copper magnetic coil system and the single-turn coil design which does not require the usual high activation laminate materials. IGNITEX systems are designed to provide high reliability and simplicity to extend machine availability in the fusion ignition regimes.