A NEAR SYMMETRICALLY ILLUMINATED DIRECT-DRIVE LASER FUSION POWER-REACTOR - SIRIUS-P

This paper describes the design of a 1000 MWe inertially confined fusi on power reactor utilizing near symmetric illumination provided by a K rF laser. The nominal laser energy is 3.4 MJ, the target gain is 118 a nd the rep-rate is 6.7 Hz. Sixty beams are distributed on ten horizont al planes with six beams in each plane forming a cone with the vertex at the reactor chamber center. The chamber is spherical internally wit h a radius of 6.5 m and is divided into 12 vertical modules consisting of two independent parts, the first wall assembly and a blanket assem bly. The first wall assembly is made of a C/C composite and is cooled with non-breeding granular solid TiO2 flowing by gravity at a constant velocity. The blanket assembly is made from SiC composite and is cool ed with granular Li2O also flowing by gravity. After going through the heat exchangers, the granular materials are returned to the reactor b y means of a fluidized bed. The first wall is protected with a xenon b uffer gas at 0.5 torr. The chamber is housed in a cylindrical building 42 m in radius and 86 m high, and is surrounded with a 1.5 m thick bi ological wall at a radius of 10 m. The laser beam ports are open to th e containment building, sharing the same vacuum. Two power conversion cycles have been analyzed, a steam Rankine cycle with an efficiency of 47% and an advanced He gas Brayton cycle at an efficiency of 51%. The nominal COE is similar to 65 mills/kWh assuming an 8% interest on cap ital.