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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.
Raymond E. Alcouffe
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 56 | Number 4 | April 1975 | Pages 321-339
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE75-A26680
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
We introduce a generalization of the neutron diffusion equation, the solution of which is an accurate approximation to the transport scalar Flux. In this generalization we utilize auxiliary transport calculations of the system of interest to compute an accurate, pointwise diffusion coefficient. We have specified a procedure to generate and improve this auxiliary information in a systematic way, leading to improvement in the calculated diffusion scalar flux. This improvement is shown to be contingent upon satisfying the condition of positive calculated-diffusion coefficients, and we present an algorithm that ensures this positivity. Our generalized diffusion theory is also shown to be compatible with conventional diffusion theory in the sense that the same methods and codes can be used to calculate a solution for both. The accuracy of the method compared to reference SN transport calculations is demonstrated for a wide variety of examples.