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Second round of Launch Pad selections includes eight newcomers
The National Reactor Innovation Center at Idaho National Laboratory has announced 13 project selections across 12 companies for the Nuclear Energy Launch Pad, a Department of Energy–led program that integrates reactor and fuel facility authorization, testing, and deployment support for private nuclear developers.
The Launch Pad emerged from the Reactor Pilot Program and Fuel Line Pilot Program.
According to INL, projects selected include reactor development and nuclear fuel cycle advancements, including fabrication, enrichment, and conversion technologies.
S. W. Haan, D. S. Clark, S. H. Baxamusa, J. Biener, L. Berzak Hopkins, T. Bunn, D. A. Callahan, L. Carlson, T. R. Dittrich, M. J. Edwards, B. A. Hammel, A. Hamza, D. E. Hinkel, D. D. Ho, D. Hoover, W. Hsing, H. Huang, O. A. Hurricane, M. A. Johnson, O. S. Jones, A. L. Kritcher, O. L. Landen, J. D. Lindl, M. M. Marinak, A. J. MacKinnon, N. B. Meezan, J. Milovich, A. Nikroo, J. L. Peterson, P. Patel, H. F. Robey, J. D. Salmonson, V. A. Smalyuk, B. K. Spears, M. Stadermann, S. V. Weber, J. L. Kline, D. C. Wilson, A. N. Simakov, A. Yi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 70 | Number 2 | August-September 2016 | Pages 121-126
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST15-244
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Experiments and analysis in the 3 years since the 2012 Target Fabrication Meeting have resulted in significant improvement in understanding of the requirements for high-performance layered implosions. Three issues have been identified that significantly degrade the performance of the implosions as they were originally configured for National Ignition Facility experiments: capsule support system, time-dependent radiation asymmetry, and transverse oxygen nonuniformity in the glow discharge polymer (GDP) ablator. Analyses suggest that the shortfalls in these three areas can explain the degraded performance of the National Ignition Campaign implosions. We present the status of work toward curing these three problems in the standard GDP ablator/gold hohlraum configuration as they affect target fabrication priorities. We also summarize the prospects for alternate ablators that might reduce these degradation mechanisms.