DEUTERIUM-TRITIUM EXPERIMENTS ON THE TOKAMAK FUSION TEST REACTOR

The deuterium-tritium (D-T) experimental program on the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor (TFTR) is underway and routine tritium operations have b een established. The technology upgrades made to the TFTR facility hav e been demonstrated to be sufficient for supporting both operations an d maintenance for an extended D-T campaign. To date fusion power has b een increased to similar to 9 MW and several physics results of import ance to the D-T reactor regime have been obtained: electron temperatur e, ion temperature, and plasma stored energy all increase substantiall y in the D-T regime relative to the D-D regime at the same neutral bea m power and comparable limiter conditioning; possible alpha electron h eating is indicated and energy confinement improvement with average io n mass is observed; and alpha losses appear to be classical with no ev idence of TAE mode activity up to the P-FUS similar to 6 MW level. Ins tability in the TAE mode frequency range has been observed at P-FUS > 7 MW and its effect on performance is under investigation. Preparation s are underway to enhance the alpha particle density further by increa sing fusion power and by extending the neutral beam pulse length to pe rmit alpha particle effects of relevance to the ITER regime to be more fully explored.