Inertial confinement fusion

Prepared by
Student of group E8-61
Y.A. Ivanov
Contents:
• 1. Fusion power.
• 2. Inertial confinement fusion.
• 3. Components.
• 4. Principles of operation.
• 5. Advantages and disadvantages.
• 6. Application.
Fusion power
 What is fusion power?
• Fusion power is a proposed form
of power generation that would
generate electricity by using
heat from nuclear fusion
reactions.
 Mechanism
• Fusion reactions occur when two
or more atomic nuclei come
close enough for long enough
that the nuclear force pulling
them together exceeds the
electrostatic force pushing them
apart, fusing them into heavier
nuclei.
 Plasma
Plasma is an ionized gas that conducts
electricity. 
• Self-organizing plasma conducts electric
and magnetic fields. Its motions can
generate fields that can in turn contain it.
• Diamagnetic plasma can generate its own
internal magnetic field. This can reject an
externally applied magnetic field, making
it diamagnetic.
• Magnetic mirrors can reflect plasma
when it moves from a low to high density
field.
 Main methods
• Magnetic confinement
• Inertial confinement
• Magnetic or electric pinches
• Inertial electrostatic confinement
Inertial confinement fusion (ICF)
Essence
Process of ICF
 Components
• In general, a system of lasers and targets is used. The target consists
of D-T fusion fuel (deuterium with one proton and one neutron, and
tritium with one proton and two neutrons).
Principles of operation
 Two approaches
• Direct • Indirect
 Direct drive
• The idea of having the driver shine directly on the fuel is known as the
“direct drive” approach. In order for the fusion fuel to reach the
required conditions, the implosion process must be extremely
uniform to avoid significant asymmetry due to Rayleigh-Taylor
instability and similar effects. At a total beam energy of 1 MJ, the fuel
capsule cannot be larger than about 2 mm before these effects break
the symmetry of the implosion. This leads to a very tight limit on the
size of the beams, which can be difficult to achieve in practice.
 Indirect drive
• This led to an alternative
concept of "indirect drive",
where the beam does not shine
directly on the fuel capsule.
 Advantages
• Inertial fusion research allows us to better understand the complex
interaction between a plasma and a laser beam.
 Disadvantages
• ICF systems face some of the same secondary power extraction
problems as magnetic systems in generating useful power from their
reactions. One of the primary concerns is how to successfully remove
heat from the reaction chamber without interfering with the targets
and driver beams.
• Even if these technical advances solve the considerable problems in
IFE, another factor working against IFE is the cost of the fuel.
 Application
• The largest institution that studied ICF was the National Ignition
Facility (NIF). But in 2014, the ICF study program was shut down, due
to an inability to achieve ignition energy.