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Division Spotlight
Fuel Cycle & Waste Management
Devoted to all aspects of the nuclear fuel cycle including waste management, worldwide. Division specific areas of interest and involvement include uranium conversion and enrichment; fuel fabrication, management (in-core and ex-core) and recycle; transportation; safeguards; high-level, low-level and mixed waste management and disposal; public policy and program management; decontamination and decommissioning environmental restoration; and excess weapons materials disposition.
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2022 ANS Annual Meeting
June 12–16, 2022
Anaheim, CA|Anaheim Hilton
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The Standards Committee is responsible for the development and maintenance of voluntary consensus standards that address the design, analysis, and operation of components, systems, and facilities related to the application of nuclear science and technology. Find out What’s New, check out the Standards Store, or Get Involved today!
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Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Finding fusion’s place
Fusion energy is attracting significant interest from governments and private capital markets. The deployment of fusion energy on a timeline that will affect climate change and offer another tool for energy security will require support from stakeholders, regulators, and policymakers around the world. Without broad support, fusion may fail to reach its potential as a “game-changing” technology to make a meaningful difference in addressing the twin challenges of climate change and geopolitical energy security.
The process of developing the necessary policy and regulatory support is already underway around the world. Leaders in the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union, China, and elsewhere are engaging with the key issues and will lead the way in setting the foundation for a global fusion industry.
J. F. Caneses, P. A. Piotrowicz, T. M. Biewer, R. H. Goulding, C. Lau, M. Showers, J. Rapp
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 75 | Number 7 | October 2019 | Pages 683-689
Technical Paper | dx.doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2019.1622988
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Linear plasma devices are cost-effective alternatives for testing materials under reactor-relevant divertor plasma conditions. An intense radio-frequency (RF) plasma source concept for the Material Plasma Exposure eXperiment (MPEX) is under development at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The source concept, Proto-MPEX, aims to produce high-density background deuterium helicon plasmas that are subsequently heated with additional RF and microwave systems to deliver reactor-relevant conditions for studies on plasma-material interaction. In this work, we focus on the plasma-producing stage and its effectiveness in converting input neutral gas into plasma, namely, the neutral gas ionization efficiency. We provide a direct quantitative measurement of the ionization efficiency by measuring the total ion flux arriving at the target region relative to the neutral gas injected at the source. Using 80 kW at 13.56 MHz and a source magnetic field of 0.05 T, the helicon plasma source delivers ion fluxes up to and heat fluxes greater than 1 to a target plate located 2 m away from the source. Under these conditions, we observe that the plasma source converts ~89% of the input neutral gas into plasma that arrives at the target as ion flux at a rate of . We demonstrate that because of the large pumping capacity of the plasma, neutral gas pumping systems are required only in the target region to maintain optimal plasma operation.
