Nuclear Fusion Reactors

AA 2013-1014
ENERGETICS
2 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Total World Energy Consumption Rate
EIA 2011
The world energy demand
is constantly increasing.
Major contributions from
increasing world
population + emerging
countries (China, India, )
How long can we sustain
the increasing demand?
3 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
How Much Power Could be Produced I
Solar energy / wind are the only renewable resource which could safely meet the world
power demand but we should exploit a huge surface (a non-negligible fraction of the
whole earth surface)
Wave/tidal and hydro could give a non-negligible contribution, but tides may be located
far fromthe final user, and water resources may be precious for other uses
Biomass has a relatively large potential, but at the cost of subtracting resources to
agriculture (==> food production)
4 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
How Much Power Could be Produced
II
Coal/Lignite, Tar-Sand Oil and Shale Oil could be attractive on the medium period (a
few 10s years), from a purely energy/production perspective
Fossil fuels in general have a number of counter indications as fuels:
Pollution: they extraction/burning cycle often is associated with large amounts
of toxic or green-house producing wastes (with natural gas as an exception)
Resource availability: hydro-carbons are often a valuable resource for a number
of industrial applications
Political issues: the major fossil fuel world reserves are concentrated in
sometimes unstable regions of the earth
5 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
How Much Power Could be Produced
III
Standard U-235 cycle is only partly attractive. Thorium and U-238 cycles are much more
interesting. However, massive exploitation of fission power meets some difficulties due
to:
Nuclear waste concern: where are we going to store long-life radioactive wastes?
Weapon proliferation concerns: U-238 and Th-232 cycles involve self-breeding
technologies, which could be used (in principle at least) also to produce large amount of
concentrated fissile materials for weapons. How are we going to control this?
Public acceptability concerns: speak about nuclear plants, and somebody will ask you
Are you planning to put a nuclear bomb in my backyard???
6 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
How Much Power Could be Produced
IV
An amount of power practically unlimited could be available, using elements diffused
everywhere (take up just water).
The basic physics principles of nuclear fusion are relatively simple and well known since
about once century now.
Apparently, we simply need to stretch our arms and grab it we will see later in detail
7 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Focus Your Mind
The world energy demand is constantly increasing, and will likely continue
to stay so in the next few decades
A few options to meet the expected energy demand may be considered:
None of them can currently be considered the ultimate solution
A mix of them is likely to be developed in the next few years/decades
The exact future energy market evolution can obviously not be predicted,
depending on:
Economical issues
Political decisions
Technical developments
A mixture of all the possible energy sources is likely to be considered in
the next future. Which role for nuclear fusion?
Potentially enormous
In fact: it will depend on the future technology evolution
8 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
INTRODUCTION TO NUCLEAR FUSION
9 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Energy Release I
Energy is another word to say stored
work
(*)

We spend some work to increase the internal

energy content of a physical system
We can obtain some work from a physical system
at the expense of its internal energy
The above statement is true of any physical
system
(*)
With the term work we mean here both the macroscopic work of a system on
another (mechanical work, electrical, ) or the individual and uncorrelated work done
by single particles of one system on single particle of another, which is usually referred
to as heat
10 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
You must supply work to push a mass of water on the
top of a hill: you may retrieve this work later as hydro-
electrical energy
You must supply electric energy (work) to charge a
battery. You will recover this energy later, when
needed
You must supply energy to a metal to extract electrons
(the extraction work)
More in general, you supply energy to break-up a
system of bodies bound together. You may recover the
same energy when you bring together the same un-
related bodies to build the bound system
Key Concepts: Energy Release II
(Examples)
11 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Energy Release III
In case of an atomic-size system, when a proton-neutron system collapses
to create one (or more) atomic nuclei, energy is released. To break-up the
same system we must supply the same amount of energy.
It is known since about a century that energy and mass are equivalent
through the relation E=mc
2
(Einstein).
The point above has an interesting consequence:
The mass of an atomic nucleus is smaller than the sum of the masses of its
constituents (protons/neutrons)
The difference between the total mass of the constituents and the nuclear
mass (the mass defect) is equivalent to the energy released when the
nucleus is formed (or to be supplied to break it up)
By dividing the nuclear mass by the atomic number we find the mass per
nucleon, a number which can be thought of as:
A measure of how much energy has been spent per each nucleon to create an atomic
nucleus
How tightly each nucleon is bound in the nucleus
12 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Energy Release IV
The total sum of a global atomic
nucleus is smaller than the sum of its
constituent masses
The smaller mass/nucleus is around
Fe
56
We can obtain energy by splitting
heavy nuclei (fission) or joining light
ones (fusion). In both cases we will
create one (or more) nuclei with
smaller average mass/nucleon
Fusion
Fission
13 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Fusion Reactions I
Mostly
considered for
the next reactor
generation
The table lists a few fusion reactions which could be considered for technological fusion.
Most of them start from light nuclei and produce heavier ones (e.g. D+T ->
4
He + n)
Only a few of them involve start from heavier nuclei to produce lighter ones
(e.g. Li + n ->
4
He + T)
Can you qualitatively explain these reactions based on the average mass curve shown in
the previous slide?
14 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Fusion Reactions II
The main fusion reaction of technological interest
nowadays is: D+T ->
4
He (3.54 Mev) + n (14.05 MeV)
This is not only due to the large amount of released
energy. We must consider also how easily the reaction
can be obtained.
When a thermal mixture of reactants (let them be 1
and 2) is brought together in a proper box, the number
of reactions per unit volume and time is given by:
n
1
n
2
<V>
The temperature dependence of the reaction rate
<V> is critical
15 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Fusion Reactions III
16
At low temperatures, the reaction rate for the DT reaction is higher than for others.
This is the main reason to consider this reaction as the main candidate for the future
reactors generation. This choice could change in the future.
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Confinement
In order to obtain the desired rate of fusion reaction
we need to bring together (confine, from now on) the
reactants (e.g. D and T) in a proper box (the reactant
mixture in our case will always be a plasma)
How do we expect a plasma environment suitable for
technologically relevant fusion reactions to look like?
A few parameters are important here:
How close we can confine the plasma particles ==>
(density)
How long we can confine the plasma ==> (confinement
time)
How good must be the achieved confinement?
17 Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Confinement
Consider a steady-state plasma
energy losses (W
out
) = input energy (W
in
)
Consider you also have measured the total
amount of energy stored in the plasma: U
We use to characterize the loss rate with the
energy confinement time
E
18
E
in
U
W

=
Large confinement time < == > small energy losses
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Energy Balance
In a plasma, you can estimate the total energy content by integrating the
average energy per particle of a perfect gas over the plasma volume:
19
{ }V nT x nTd W 3 3
3
= =

If each fusion reaction delivers the energy E, the total thermonuclear

power per unit volume delivered to the plasma is
E v n p
Tn

2
4
1
=

= x d p P
Tn H
3
Power losses (cooling) are characterized by the (diffusive) energy
confinement time
E
E
L
W
P

=
At steady state H L
P P =
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B
Key Concepts: Confinement
Which confinement time / density for a fusion relevant
plasma?
There are two concepts around:
The plasma will be (thermally) self sustained (IGNITION)
The plasma will be almost thermally self sustained (large Q)
The IGNITION requirements are easily expressed by the so-
called Lawson criterion
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B 20
E rad in
U P P W

/ = =
At ignition:
2
n P P
fus

it is the product of the reactant densities

2
n P
rad

(trust it)
n U
Remember: approx 3T/2 energy per particle
Key Concepts: Confinement
By combining the previous expressions, a minimum
requirement for ignition may be derived:
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B 21
( )
c
E E
n n
The critical value of the product n
E
is estimated to be (n
E
)
c
~
510
20
sm
-3
A better estimate may be done considering the dependence of
E
itself on the temperature, giving n
L
I S 1u
21
m
-3
KeV s
It expresses the condition that no additional energy input should be
required to sustain the plasma: all the needed energy comes from
fusion reaction (through particles)
IGNITION seems to be very demanding for the current technologies,
so an alternative concept is also considered
Key Concepts: Confinement
We define the energy gain for a reactor as
Q = (Output power)/(External input power)
At IGNITION, Q = (no external input power)
Large but finite values of Q (i.e. n
E
(n
E
)
c
) could still
be economically interesting
Characteristic values:
Q = 5: P

~ P
external heating
: not economically attractive, but
interesting for physics/engineering preparatory
experiments
Q = 10: P

is the main heating source. This is the target of

the next generation of experiments
Q = 100: commercial reactor
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B 22
Key Concepts: Energy Gain
23
We see that there is a minimum value of
the product nT below which a reactor is
not possible: ~ 1e21Pa s
ITER aims to reach at least Q = 10
At nT slightly above 5 it would be possible
in principle to reach ignition, a condition
with Q = inf (i.e. no input power required).
This condition will not be obtained by
ITER.
Typical values for current experiments: n=10
20
m
-3
, T = 10 KeV, = 1s
Nuclear Reactor Physics and Engineering B