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In transition: Commercializing fusion power
Commercial fusion power is closer than ever. There are now around 30 U.S. fusion companies, several of which claim to be on track to connect to the grid as early as the 2030s.
Tokamak and laser inertial confinement approaches benefit from decades of research at facilities such as the National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and ITER, with alternative concepts including stellarator, magnetic mirror, and Z-pinch confinement also making notable progress as private and government funding for fusion increases.
G. Palmiotti, M. Salvatores
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 87 | Number 3 | July 1984 | Pages 333-348
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE87-333
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Integral experiments play an essential role in the reduction of design uncertainties related to liquid-metal fast breeder reactor neutronics calculations. Spectrum-dependent integral parameters, such as the critical balance, have been the subject of extensive experimental studies in the various critical facility programs of the leading fast reactor programs in view of the extrapolation of the observed results to power reactors. Space-dependent parameters, such as power distribution perturbation and control rod effects, have also been the subject of large experimental programs, but it has been more difficult to find an unambiguous, systematic approach to extrapolate to the reference power reactors with the particular purpose of defining bias factors and uncertainties to be used in design calculations. Different approaches are recalled in the case of spectrum-dependent integral parameters, and some suggestions are made to define a systematic approach for the space-dependent parameters using the existing critical facilities, i.e., reduced-size cores and limited fuel inventories.