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Antares achieves zero-power criticality at INL
Leveraging more than $140 million in private capital fundraising, over 322,000 square feet of operational manufacturing space, and multifaceted partnerships with the Departments of Energy and Defense, reactor start-up Antares has become the first company involved in the Reactor Pilot Program to achieve zero-power fueled criticality—a full month ahead of the July 4 deadline set by President Trump’s Executive Order 14301.
This milestone, announced yesterday, was achieved with the company’s Mark-0: a sodium heat-pipe-cooled, TRISO-fueled microreactor. The Mark-0 is a forerunner to the company’s flagship design, which it calls the R1. For Antares, this development represents a key validation of its reactor physics, control systems, and supply chain.
R. Fischer, A. Bock, M. Dunne, J. C. Fuchs, L. Giannone, K. Lackner, P. J. McCarthy, E. Poli, R. Preuss, M. Rampp, M. Schubert, J. Stober, W. Suttrop, G. Tardini, M. Weiland, ASDEX Upgrade Team
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 69 | Number 2 | April 2016 | Pages 526-536
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST15-185
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A tokamak equilibrium reconstruction can benefit much from internal measurements of the current distribution. If lacking robust internal measurements, the reconstruction will be ill posed in the plasma core, not allowing for a sensible estimation of the current distribution. Such deficiencies can be compensated for by modeling the current distribution evolution by employing the current diffusion equation between successive equilibria. A scheme for the coupling of the predictive current diffusion equation with the equilibrium reconstruction from an inverse Grad-Shafranov equilibrium solver minimizing a least-squares criterion on measured and modeled data is proposed. The scheme is intended for routine equilibrium analysis shortly after the discharge where all diagnostic data are available. Results from the implementation at ASDEX Upgrade are shown, applied to a reversed-shear plasma with counter-current electron cyclotron current drive and to the start-up phase of the plasma. Results are compared to TRANSP calculations.