Overview of Australian activities of fusion neutronics

The new status of the H-1NF Heliac Stellarator as a National Facility and t he signed international Implementing Agreement on Collaboration in the Deve lopment of the Stellarator Concept should together be a significant encoura gement for further fusion research in Australia. In this report the future of fusion research in Australia is discussed with special attention being p aid to the importance of Stellarator Power Plant Studies and in particular stellarator fusion neutronics. The main differences between tokamak and ste llarator neutronics analyses are identified, namely the neutron wall loadin g, geometrical modelling and total heating in in-vessel reactor components including toroidal held (TF) coils. An approach to stellarator (TF) coils h eating calculations is discussed. This approach is a modification of a prev iously reported method of total heating calculations in tokamak TF coils. D ue to the more complicated nature of stellarator neutronics analyses, simpl ified approaches to fusion neutronics already developed for tokamaks are ex pected to be even more important and widely used for designing a Conceptual Stellarator Power Plant. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserve d.