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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.
M. R. Baer, S. K. Griffiths, J. E. Shepherd
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 88 | Number 3 | November 1984 | Pages 436-444
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE84-A18597
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Water fogs are recognized as an effective means to mitigate the effects of large-scale hydrogen combustion that might accompany some loss-of-coolant nuclear reactor accidents. Fogs of sufficiently high density to produce large beneficial effects may, however, be difficult to generate and maintain. An alternate method of suspending the desired mass of water is via high expansion-ratio aqueous foams. Because, in practice, the foam would be generated using the combustible gaseous contents of the containment vessel, combustion occurs inside the foam cells. Although foams generated with inert gas have been well studied for use in fire fighting, little is known about combustion in foams generated with flammable mixtures. To help assess the usefulness of aqueous foams in a mitigation plan, several open-tube tests and more than 100 closed-vessel tests of hydrogen/air combustion, with and without foam were conducted. At low and intermediate hydrogen concentrations, the foam has little effect on the ultimate isochoric pressure rise. Above 15% hydrogen concentration, the foam causes a significant reduction in the pressure rise. The maximum effect occurs at ∼28% hydrogen (the stoichiometric limit is 29.6% hydrogen) where the peak overpressure is reduced by 2½. Despite this overall pressure reduction, the flame speed is increased by up to an order of magnitude for combustion in the foam, and strong pressure fluctuations are observed near a hydrogen concentration of 23%.