TRADEOFFS BETWEEN IMPROVED PERFORMANCE AND INCREASED COST OF ADVANCEDMATERIALS IN COMMERCIAL POWER-PLANTS

Advanced structural materials for fusion in-vessel components offer th e promise of improved safety and environmental features as well as imp roved engineering performance, as characterized by high thermal conver sion efficiency and high power density limits. However, the cost of ad vance materials is expected to be much higher than that of more conven tional steel-bused alloys. Therefore, the economic advantage is limite d. In this study, we compare a high-performance vanadium-based power p lant and a lower-performance ferritic steel plant. Self-consistency is maintained through the use of the ARIES systems code. The tradeoffs i nclude the effect of coolant outlet temperature on thermal conversion efficiency, power density limitations, component lifetime and availabi lity. Ideally, comparisons should be made between fully-detailed desig n concepts. However, a rough systems-level analysis allows identificat ion of the relative magnitude of the economic advantages expected from ''high performance'' materials.