Fusion reactor. Thermonuclear reactors: do they have a future? Thermonuclear reactors in the world

How did it all start? The “energy challenge” arose as a result of a combination of the following three factors:

1. Humanity now consumes a huge amount of energy.

Currently, the world's energy consumption is about 15.7 terawatts (TW). Dividing this value by the world population, we get approximately 2400 watts per person, which can be easily estimated and visualized. The energy consumed by every inhabitant of the Earth (including children) corresponds to the round-the-clock operation of 24 hundred-watt electric lamps. However, the consumption of this energy across the planet is very uneven, as it is very large in several countries and negligible in others. Consumption (in terms of one person) is equal to 10.3 kW in the USA (one of the record values), 6.3 kW in the Russian Federation, 5.1 kW in the UK, etc., but, on the other hand, it is equal only 0.21 kW in Bangladesh (only 2% of US energy consumption!).

2. World energy consumption is increasing dramatically.

According to the International Energy Agency (2006), global energy consumption is expected to increase by 50% by 2030. Developed countries could, of course, do just fine without additional energy, but this growth is necessary to lift people out of poverty in developing countries, where 1.5 billion people suffer from severe power shortages.

3. Currently, 80% of the world's energy comes from burning fossil fuels (oil, coal and gas), the use of which:
a) potentially poses a risk of catastrophic environmental changes;
b) inevitably must end someday.

From what has been said, it is clear that now we must prepare for the end of the era of using fossil fuels

Currently on nuclear power plants on a large scale receive energy released during fission reactions atomic nuclei. The creation and development of such stations should be encouraged in every possible way, but it must be taken into account that the reserves of one of the most important materials for their operation (cheap uranium) can also be completely used up within the next 50 years. The possibilities of nuclear fission-based energy can (and should) be significantly expanded through the use of more efficient energy cycles, allowing the amount of energy produced to almost double. To develop energy in this direction, it is necessary to create thorium reactors (the so-called thorium breeder reactors or breeder reactors), in which the reaction produces more thorium than the original uranium, as a result of which the total amount of energy produced for a given amount of substance increases by 40 times . It also seems promising to create plutonium breeders using fast neutrons, which are much more efficient than uranium reactors and can produce 60 times more energy. It may be that to develop these areas it will be necessary to develop new, non-standard methods for obtaining uranium (for example, from sea water, which seems to be the most accessible).

Fusion power plants

The figure shows a schematic diagram (not to scale) of the device and operating principle of a thermonuclear power plant. In the central part there is a toroidal (donut-shaped) chamber with a volume of ~2000 m3, filled with tritium-deuterium (T-D) plasma heated to a temperature above 100 M°C. The neutrons produced during the fusion reaction (1) leave the “magnetic bottle” and enter the shell shown in the figure with a thickness of about 1 m.

Inside the shell, neutrons collide with lithium atoms, resulting in a reaction that produces tritium:

neutron + lithium → helium + tritium

In addition, competing reactions occur in the system (without the formation of tritium), as well as many reactions with the release of additional neutrons, which then also lead to the formation of tritium (in this case, the release of additional neutrons can be significantly enhanced, for example, by introducing beryllium atoms into the shell and lead). General conclusion is that in this installation a nuclear fusion reaction can (at least theoretically) occur, in which tritium will be formed. In this case, the amount of tritium produced should not only meet the needs of the installation itself, but also be even somewhat larger, which will make it possible to supply new installations with tritium. It is this operating concept that must be tested and implemented in the ITER reactor described below.

In addition, neutrons must heat the shell in so-called pilot plants (in which relatively “ordinary” construction materials will be used) to approximately 400°C. In the future, it is planned to create improved installations with a shell heating temperature above 1000°C, which can be achieved through the use of the latest high-strength materials (such as silicon carbide composites). The heat generated in the shell, as in conventional stations, is taken by the primary cooling circuit with a coolant (containing, for example, water or helium) and transferred to the secondary circuit, where water steam is produced and supplied to the turbines.

1985 - Soviet Union proposed the next generation Tokamak installation, using the experience of four leading countries in creating fusion reactors. The United States of America, together with Japan and the European Community, put forward a proposal for the implementation of the project.

Currently, in France, construction is underway on the international experimental thermonuclear reactor ITER (International Tokamak Experimental Reactor), described below, which will be the first tokamak capable of “igniting” plasma.

The most advanced existing tokamak installations have long reached temperatures of about 150 M°C, close to the values required for the operation of a fusion station, but the ITER reactor should be the first large-scale power plant designed for long-term operation. In the future, it will be necessary to significantly improve its operating parameters, which will require, first of all, increasing the pressure in the plasma, since the rate of nuclear fusion at a given temperature is proportional to the square of the pressure. Main scientific problem this is due to the fact that when the pressure in the plasma increases, very complex and dangerous instabilities arise, that is, unstable operating modes.

Why do we need this?

The main advantage of nuclear fusion is that it requires only very small amounts of substances that are very common in nature as fuel. The nuclear fusion reaction in the described installations can lead to the release of a huge amount of energy, ten million times higher than the standard heat release during conventional chemical reactions(like burning fossil fuels). For comparison, we point out that the amount of coal required to power a thermal power plant with a capacity of 1 gigawatt (GW) is 10,000 tons per day (ten railway cars), and a fusion plant of the same power will consume only about 1 kilogram of the D+T mixture per day .

Deuterium is a stable isotope of hydrogen; In about one out of every 3,350 molecules of ordinary water, one of the hydrogen atoms is replaced by deuterium (a legacy we inherited from Big Bang). This fact makes it easy to organize fairly cheap production of the required amount of deuterium from water. It is more difficult to obtain tritium, which is unstable (half-life is about 12 years, as a result of which its content in nature is negligible), however, as shown above, tritium will appear directly inside the thermonuclear installation during operation, due to the reaction of neutrons with lithium.

Thus, the initial fuel for a fusion reactor is lithium and water. Lithium is a common metal widely used in household appliances (batteries for mobile phones and so on.). The installation described above, even taking into account non-ideal efficiency, will be able to produce 200,000 kWh of electrical energy, which is equivalent to the energy contained in 70 tons of coal. The amount of lithium required for this is contained in one computer battery, and the amount of deuterium is in 45 liters of water. The above value corresponds to the current electricity consumption (calculated per person) in the EU countries over 30 years. The very fact that such an insignificant amount of lithium can ensure the generation of such an amount of electricity (without CO2 emissions and without the slightest air pollution) is a fairly serious argument for the fastest and most vigorous development of thermonuclear energy (despite all the difficulties and problems) and even without one hundred percent confidence in the success of such research.

Deuterium should last for millions of years, and reserves of easily mined lithium are sufficient to supply needs for hundreds of years. Even if lithium in rocks runs out, we can extract it from water, where it is found in concentrations high enough (100 times the concentration of uranium) to make its extraction economically viable.

An experimental thermonuclear reactor (International thermonuclear experimental reactor) is being built near the city of Cadarache in France. The main goal of the ITER project is to implement a controlled thermonuclear fusion reaction on an industrial scale.

Per unit weight of thermonuclear fuel, about 10 million times more energy is obtained than when burning the same amount of organic fuel, and about a hundred times more than when splitting uranium nuclei in the reactors of currently operating nuclear power plants. If the calculations of scientists and designers come true, this will give humanity an inexhaustible source of energy.

Therefore, a number of countries (Russia, India, China, Korea, Kazakhstan, USA, Canada, Japan, European Union countries) joined forces in creating the International Thermonuclear Research Reactor - a prototype of new power plants.

ITER is a facility that creates conditions for the synthesis of hydrogen and tritium atoms (an isotope of hydrogen), resulting in the formation of a new atom - a helium atom. This process is accompanied by a huge burst of energy: the temperature of the plasma in which the thermonuclear reaction occurs is about 150 million degrees Celsius (for comparison, the temperature of the Sun’s core is 40 million degrees). In this case, the isotopes burn out, leaving virtually no radioactive waste.
The scheme of participation in the international project provides for the supply of reactor components and financing of its construction. In exchange for this, each of the participating countries receives full access to all technologies for creating a thermonuclear reactor and to the results of all experimental work on this reactor, which will serve as the basis for the design of serial power thermonuclear reactors.

The reactor, based on the principle of thermonuclear fusion, has no radioactive radiation and is completely safe for the environment. It can be located almost anywhere globe, and the fuel for it is ordinary water. Construction of ITER is expected to last about ten years, after which the reactor is expected to be in use for 20 years.

In the coming years, the interests of Russia in the Council of the International Organization for the Construction of the ITER Thermonuclear Reactor will be represented by Corresponding Member of the Russian Academy of Sciences Mikhail Kovalchuk, Director of the Russian Research Center Kurchatov Institute, Institute of Crystallography of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Scientific Secretary of the Presidential Council on Science, Technology and Education. Kovalchuk will temporarily replace academician Evgeniy Velikhov in this post, who was elected chairman of the ITER International Council for the next two years and does not have the right to combine this position with the duties of an official representative of a participating country.

The total cost of construction is estimated at 5 billion euros, and the same amount will be required for trial operation of the reactor. The shares of India, China, Korea, Russia, the USA and Japan each account for approximately 10 percent of the total value, 45 percent comes from the countries of the European Union. However, the European states have not yet agreed on how exactly the costs will be distributed between them. Because of this, the start of construction was postponed to April 2010. Despite the latest delay, scientists and officials involved in ITER say they will be able to complete the project by 2018.

The estimated thermonuclear power of ITER is 500 megawatts. Individual magnet parts reach a weight of 200 to 450 tons. To cool ITER, 33 thousand cubic meters of water per day will be required.

In 1998, the United States stopped funding its participation in the project. After the Republicans came to power and rolling blackouts began in California, the Bush administration announced increased investment in energy. The United States did not intend to participate in the international project and was engaged in its own thermonuclear project. In early 2002, President Bush's technology adviser John Marburger III said that the United States had changed its mind and intended to return to the project.

In terms of the number of participants, the project is comparable to another major international scientific project - the International Space Station. The cost of ITER, which previously reached 8 billion dollars, then amounted to less than 4 billion. As a result of the withdrawal of the United States from participation, it was decided to reduce the reactor power from 1.5 GW to 500 MW. Accordingly, the price of the project has also decreased.

In June 2002, the symposium “ITER Days in Moscow” was held in the Russian capital. It discussed the theoretical, practical and organizational problems of reviving the project, the success of which can change the fate of humanity and give it the new kind energy, comparable in efficiency and economy only to the energy of the Sun.

In July 2010, representatives of the countries participating in the ITER international thermonuclear reactor project approved its budget and construction schedule at an extraordinary meeting held in Cadarache, France. .

At the last extraordinary meeting, the project participants approved the start date for the first experiments with plasma - 2019. Full experiments are planned for March 2027, although the project management asked technical specialists to try to optimize the process and begin experiments in 2026. The meeting participants also decided on the costs of constructing the reactor, but the amounts planned to be spent on creating the installation were not disclosed. According to information received by the editor of the ScienceNOW portal from an unnamed source, by the time experiments begin, the cost of the ITER project could reach 16 billion euros.

The meeting in Cadarache also marked the first official working day for the new project director, Japanese physicist Osamu Motojima. Before him, the project had been led since 2005 by the Japanese Kaname Ikeda, who wished to leave his post immediately after the budget and construction deadlines were approved.

The ITER fusion reactor is a joint project of the European Union, Switzerland, Japan, USA, Russia, South Korea, China and India. The idea of creating ITER has been under consideration since the 80s of the last century, however, due to financial and technical difficulties, the cost of the project is constantly growing, and the construction start date is constantly being postponed. In 2009, experts expected that work on creating the reactor would begin in 2010. Later, this date was moved, and first 2018 and then 2019 were named as the launch time of the reactor.

Thermonuclear fusion reactions are reactions of fusion of nuclei of light isotopes to form a heavier nucleus, which are accompanied by a huge release of energy. In theory, thermonuclear reactors can produce a lot of energy at low cost, but this moment scientists spend much more energy and money to start and maintain the fusion reaction.

Thermonuclear fusion is a cheap and environmentally friendly way to produce energy. On the Sun, uncontrollable events have been happening for billions of years. thermonuclear fusion- helium is formed from the heavy hydrogen isotope deuterium. This releases a colossal amount of energy. However, people on Earth have not yet learned to control such reactions.

The ITER reactor will use hydrogen isotopes as fuel. During a thermonuclear reaction, energy is released when light atoms combine into heavier ones. To achieve this, the gas must be heated to a temperature of over 100 million degrees - much higher than the temperature at the center of the Sun. Gas at this temperature turns into plasma. At the same time, atoms of hydrogen isotopes merge, turning into helium atoms with the release of a large number of neutrons. A power plant operating on this principle will use the energy of neutrons slowed down by a layer of dense material (lithium).

Why did the creation of thermonuclear installations take so long?

Why have such important and valuable installations, the benefits of which have been discussed for almost half a century, not yet been created? There are three main reasons (discussed below), the first of which can be called external or social, and the other two - internal, that is, determined by the laws and conditions of the development of thermonuclear energy itself.

1. For a long time it was believed that the problem practical use thermonuclear fusion energy does not require urgent decisions and actions, since back in the 80s of the last century, fossil fuel sources seemed inexhaustible, and environmental problems and climate change did not concern the public. In 1976, the U.S. Department of Energy's Fusion Energy Advisory Committee attempted to estimate the time frame for R&D and a demonstration fusion power plant under various research funding options. At the same time, it was discovered that the volume of annual research funding in in this direction are completely insufficient, and if the existing level of appropriations is maintained, the creation of thermonuclear installations will never be successful, since the allocated funds do not correspond even to the minimum, critical level.

2. A more serious obstacle to the development of research in this area is that a thermonuclear installation of the type under discussion cannot be created and demonstrated on a small scale. From the explanations presented below, it will become clear that thermonuclear fusion requires not only magnetic confinement of the plasma, but also sufficient heating of it. The ratio of expended and received energy increases at least in proportion to the square of the linear dimensions of the installation, as a result of which the scientific and technical capabilities and advantages of thermonuclear installations can be tested and demonstrated only at fairly large stations, such as the mentioned ITER reactor. Society was simply not ready to finance such large projects until there was sufficient confidence in success.

3. The development of thermonuclear energy was very complex, however (despite insufficient funding and difficulties in choosing centers for creating the JET and ITER installations) last years There is clear progress, although a functioning station has not yet been created.

The modern world is facing a very serious energy challenge, which can more accurately be called an “uncertain energy crisis.” The problem is related to the fact that reserves of fossil fuels may run out in the second half of this century. Moreover, the combustion of fossil fuels may lead to the need to somehow bind and “save” the emissions released into the atmosphere. carbon dioxide(the CCS program mentioned above) to prevent serious changes in the planet's climate.

Currently, almost all the energy consumed by humanity is created by burning fossil fuels, and the solution to the problem may be associated with the use of solar energy or nuclear energy (creation of fast neutron breeder reactors, etc.). Global problem, driven by the growing population of developing countries and their need to improve living standards and increase the amount of energy produced, cannot be solved only on the basis of the approaches considered, although, of course, any attempts to develop alternative methods of energy production should be encouraged.

Strictly speaking, we have a small choice of behavioral strategies and the development of thermonuclear energy is extremely important, even despite the lack of a guarantee of success. The Financial Times newspaper (dated January 25, 2004) wrote about this:

Let's hope that there will be no major and unexpected surprises on the path to the development of thermonuclear energy. In this case, in about 30 years we will be able to file for the first time electricity from it to the energy networks, and in just over 10 years the first commercial thermonuclear power plant will begin operating. It is possible that in the second half of this century, nuclear fusion energy will begin to replace fossil fuels and gradually begin to play an increasingly important role. important role in providing energy to humanity on a global scale.

There is no absolute guarantee that the task of creating thermonuclear energy (as an effective and large-scale source of energy for all humanity) will be completed successfully, but the likelihood of success in this direction is quite high. Considering the enormous potential of thermonuclear stations, all costs for projects for their rapid (and even accelerated) development can be considered justified, especially since these investments look very modest against the backdrop of the monstrous global energy market ($4 trillion per year8). Meeting humanity's energy needs is a very serious problem. As fossil fuels become less available (and their use becomes undesirable), the situation is changing, and we simply cannot afford not to develop fusion energy.

To the question “When will thermonuclear energy appear?” Lev Artsimovich (a recognized pioneer and leader of research in this field) once responded that “it will be created when it becomes truly necessary for humanity”

ITER will be the first fusion reactor to produce more energy than it consumes. Scientists measure this characteristic using a simple coefficient they call "Q." If ITER achieves all its scientific goals, it will produce 10 times more energy than it consumes. The latest device to be built, the Joint European Thor in England, is a smaller prototype fusion reactor that is in its final stages scientific research reached a Q value of almost 1. This means that it produced exactly the same amount of energy as it consumed. ITER will go beyond this by demonstrating energy creation from fusion and achieving a Q value of 10. The idea is to generate 500 MW from an energy consumption of approximately 50 MW. Thus, one of the scientific goals of ITER is to prove that a Q value of 10 can be achieved.

Another scientific goal is that ITER will have a very long "burn" time - a pulse of extended duration up to one hour. ITER is a research experimental reactor that cannot produce energy continuously. When ITER starts operating, it will be on for one hour, after which it will need to be turned off. This is important because until now the typical devices we have created have been capable of having a burning time of several seconds or even tenths of a second - this is the maximum. The "Joint European Torus" reached its Q value of 1 with a burn time of approximately two seconds with a pulse length of 20 seconds. But a process that lasts a few seconds is not truly permanent. By analogy with starting a car engine: briefly turning on the engine and then turning it off is not yet real operation of the car. Only when you drive your car for half an hour will it reach a constant operating mode and demonstrate that such a car can actually be driven.

That is, from a technical and scientific point of view, ITER will provide a Q value of 10 and an increased burn time.

The thermonuclear fusion program is truly international and broad in nature. People are already counting on the success of ITER and are thinking about the next step - creating a prototype of an industrial thermonuclear reactor called DEMO. To build it, ITER needs to work. We must achieve our scientific goals because this will mean that the ideas we put forward are entirely feasible. However, I agree that you should always think about what comes next. In addition, as ITER operates for 25-30 years, our knowledge will gradually deepen and expand, and we will be able to more accurately outline our next step.

Indeed, there is no debate about whether ITER should be a tokamak. Some scientists pose the question quite differently: should ITER exist? Specialists in different countries, developing their own, not so large-scale thermonuclear projects, argue that such a large reactor is not needed at all.

However, their opinion should hardly be considered authoritative. Physicists who have been working with toroidal traps for several decades were involved in the creation of ITER. The design of the experimental thermonuclear reactor in Karadash was based on all the knowledge gained during experiments on dozens of predecessor tokamaks. And these results indicate that the reactor must be a tokamak, and a large one at that.

JET At the moment, the most successful tokamak can be considered JET, built by the EU in the British town of Abingdon. This is the largest tokamak-type reactor created to date, the large radius of the plasma torus is 2.96 meters. The power of the thermonuclear reaction has already reached more than 20 megawatts with a retention time of up to 10 seconds. The reactor returns about 40% of the energy put into the plasma.

It is the physics of plasma that determines the energy balance,” Igor Semenov told Infox.ru. What is energy balance, MIPT associate professor described at simple example: “We all saw the fire burning. In fact, it is not wood that burns there, but gas. The energy chain there is like this: the gas burns, the wood heats, the wood evaporates, the gas burns again. Therefore, if we throw water on the fire, we will abruptly take energy from the system for the phase transition liquid water into a vapor state. The balance will become negative and the fire will go out. There is another way - we can simply take the firebrands and spread them in space. The fire will also go out. It’s the same in the thermonuclear reactor we are building. The dimensions are chosen to create an appropriate positive energy balance for this reactor. Sufficient to build a real nuclear power plant in the future, solving at this experimental stage all the problems that currently remain unresolved.”

The dimensions of the reactor were changed once. This happened at the turn of the 20th-21st centuries, when the United States withdrew from the project, and the remaining members realized that the ITER budget (by that time it was estimated at 10 billion US dollars) was too large. Physicists and engineers were required to reduce the cost of installation. And this could only be done due to size. The “redesign” of ITER was led by the French physicist Robert Aymar, who previously worked on the French Tore Supra tokamak in Karadash. The outer radius of the plasma torus has been reduced from 8.2 to 6.3 meters. However, the risks associated with the reduction in size were partly compensated for by several additional superconducting magnets, which made it possible to implement the plasma confinement mode, which was open and studied at that time.

ITER - International Thermonuclear Reactor (ITER)

Human energy consumption is growing every year, which pushes the energy sector towards active development. Thus, with the emergence of nuclear power plants, the amount of energy generated around the world increased significantly, which made it possible to safely use energy for all the needs of mankind. For example, 72.3% of the electricity generated in France comes from nuclear power plants, in Ukraine - 52.3%, in Sweden - 40.0%, in the UK - 20.4%, in Russia - 17.1%. However, technology does not stand still, and in order to meet the further energy needs of future countries, scientists are working on a number of innovative projects, one of which is ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor).

Although the profitability of this installation is still in question, according to the work of many researchers, the creation and subsequent development of controlled thermonuclear fusion technology can result in a powerful and safe source of energy. Let's look at some of the positive aspects of such an installation:

The main fuel of a thermonuclear reactor is hydrogen, which means practically inexhaustible reserves of nuclear fuel.
Hydrogen can be produced by processing seawater, which is available to most countries. It follows from this that a monopoly of fuel resources cannot arise.
The probability of an emergency explosion during the operation of a thermonuclear reactor is much less than during the operation of a nuclear reactor. According to researchers, even in the event of an accident, radiation emissions will not pose a danger to the population, which means there is no need for evacuation.
Unlike nuclear reactors, fusion reactors produce radioactive waste that has a short half-life, meaning it decays faster. Also, there are no combustion products in thermonuclear reactors.
A fusion reactor does not require materials that are also used for nuclear weapons. This eliminates the possibility of covering up the production of nuclear weapons by processing materials for the needs of a nuclear reactor.

Thermonuclear reactor - inside view

However, there are also a number of technical shortcomings that researchers constantly encounter.

For example, the current version of the fuel, presented in the form of a mixture of deuterium and tritium, requires the development of new technologies. For example, at the end of the first series of tests at the JET thermonuclear reactor, the largest to date, the reactor became so radioactive that the development of a special robotic maintenance system was further required to complete the experiment. Another disappointing factor in the operation of a thermonuclear reactor is its efficiency - 20%, while the efficiency of a nuclear power plant is 33-34%, and a thermal power plant is 40%.

Creation of the ITER project and launch of the reactor

The ITER project dates back to 1985, when the Soviet Union proposed the joint creation of a tokamak - a toroidal chamber with magnetic coils that can hold plasma using magnets, thereby creating the conditions required for a thermonuclear fusion reaction to occur. In 1992, a quadripartite agreement on the development of ITER was signed, the parties to which were the EU, the USA, Russia and Japan. In 1994, the Republic of Kazakhstan joined the project, in 2001 - Canada, in 2003 - South Korea and China, in 2005 - India. In 2005, the location for the construction of the reactor was determined - the Cadarache Nuclear Energy Research Center, France.

Construction of the reactor began with the preparation of a pit for the foundation. So the parameters of the pit were 130 x 90 x 17 meters. The entire tokamak complex will weigh 360,000 tons, of which 23,000 tons are the tokamak itself.

Various elements of the ITER complex will be developed and delivered to the construction site from all over the world. So in 2016, part of the conductors for poloidal coils was developed in Russia, which were then sent to China, which will produce the coils themselves.

Obviously, such a large-scale work is not at all easy to organize; a number of countries have repeatedly failed to keep up with the project schedule, as a result of which the launch of the reactor was constantly postponed. So, according to last year’s (2016) June message: “receipt of the first plasma is planned for December 2025.”

The operating mechanism of the ITER tokamak

The term "tokamak" comes from a Russian acronym that means "toroidal chamber with magnetic coils."

The heart of a tokamak is its torus-shaped vacuum chamber. Inside, under extreme temperature and pressure, the hydrogen fuel gas becomes plasma—a hot, electrically charged gas. As is known, stellar matter is represented by plasma, and thermonuclear reactions in the solar core occur precisely under conditions of elevated temperature and pressure. Similar conditions for the formation, retention, compression and heating of plasma are created by means of massive magnetic coils that are located around a vacuum vessel. The influence of magnets will limit the hot plasma from the walls of the vessel.

Before the process begins, air and impurities are removed from the vacuum chamber. Magnetic systems that will help control the plasma are then charged and gaseous fuel is introduced. When a powerful electric current is passed through the vessel, the gas is electrically split and becomes ionized (that is, electrons leave the atoms) and forms a plasma.

As the plasma particles are activated and collide, they also begin to heat up. Assisted heating techniques help bring the plasma to melting temperatures (150 to 300 million °C). Particles "excited" to this degree can overcome their natural electromagnetic repulsion upon collision, releasing enormous amounts of energy as a result of such collisions.

The tokamak design consists of the following elements:

Vacuum vessel

(“donut”) is a toroidal chamber made of stainless steel. Its large diameter is 19 m, the small one is 6 m, and its height is 11 m. The volume of the chamber is 1,400 m 3, and its weight is more than 5,000 tons. The walls of the vacuum vessel are double; a coolant will circulate between the walls, which will be distilled water. water. To avoid water contamination, the inner wall of the chamber is protected from radioactive radiation using a blanket.

Blanket

(“blanket”) – consists of 440 fragments covering inner surface cameras. The total banquet area is 700m2. Each fragment is a kind of cassette, the body of which is made of copper, and the front wall is removable and made of beryllium. The parameters of the cassettes are 1x1.5 m, and the mass is no more than 4.6 tons. Such beryllium cassettes will slow down high-energy neutrons formed during the reaction. During neutron moderation, heat will be released and removed by the cooling system. It should be noted that beryllium dust formed as a result of reactor operation can cause a serious disease called beryllium and also has a carcinogenic effect. For this reason, strict security measures are being developed at the complex.

Tokamak in section. Yellow - solenoid, orange - toroidal field (TF) and poloidal field (PF) magnets, blue - blanket, light blue - VV - vacuum vessel, purple - divertor

(“ashtray”) of the poloidal type is a device whose main task is to “cleanse” the plasma of dirt resulting from the heating and interaction of the blanket-covered chamber walls with it. When such contaminants enter the plasma, they begin to radiate intensely, resulting in additional radiation losses. It is located at the bottom of the tokomak and uses magnets to direct the upper layers of plasma (which are the most contaminated) into the cooling chamber. Here the plasma cools and turns into gas, after which it is pumped back out of the chamber. Beryllium dust, after entering the chamber, is practically unable to return back to the plasma. Thus, plasma contamination remains only on the surface and does not penetrate deeper.

Cryostat

- the largest component of the tokomak, which is a stainless steel shell with a volume of 16,000 m 2 (29.3 x 28.6 m) and a mass of 3,850 tons. Other elements of the system will be located inside the cryostat, and it itself serves as a barrier between the tokamak and the outside environment. On its inner walls there will be thermal screens cooled by circulating nitrogen at a temperature of 80 K (-193.15 °C).

Magnetic system

– a set of elements that serve to contain and control plasma inside a vacuum vessel. It is a set of 48 elements:

Toroidal field coils are located outside the vacuum chamber and inside the cryostat. They are presented in 18 pieces, each measuring 15 x 9 m and weighing approximately 300 tons. Together, these coils generate a magnetic field of 11.8 Tesla around the plasma torus and store energy of 41 GJ.
Poloidal field coils – located on top of the toroidal field coils and inside the cryostat. These coils are responsible for forming magnetic field, separating the mass of plasma from the walls of the chamber and compressing the plasma for adiabatic heating. The number of such coils is 6. Two of the coils have a diameter of 24 m and a mass of 400 tons. The remaining four are somewhat smaller.
The central solenoid is located in the inner part of the toroidal chamber, or rather in the “donut hole”. The principle of its operation is similar to a transformer, and the main task is to excite an inductive current in the plasma.
Correction coils are located inside the vacuum vessel, between the blanket and the chamber wall. Their task is to maintain the shape of the plasma, capable of locally “bulging” and even touching the walls of the vessel. Allows you to reduce the level of interaction of the chamber walls with the plasma, and therefore the level of its contamination, and also reduces the wear of the chamber itself.

Structure of the ITER complex

The tokamak design described above “in a nutshell” is a highly complex innovative mechanism assembled through the efforts of several countries. However, for its full operation, a whole complex of buildings located near the tokamak is required. Among them:

Control, Data Access and Communication System – CODAC. Located in a number of buildings of the ITER complex.
Fuel storage and fuel system - serves to deliver fuel to the tokamak.
Vacuum system - consists of more than four hundred vacuum pumps, the task of which is to pump out thermonuclear reaction products, as well as various contaminants from the vacuum chamber.
Cryogenic system – represented by a nitrogen and helium circuit. The helium circuit will normalize the temperature in the tokamak, the work (and therefore the temperature) of which does not occur continuously, but in pulses. The nitrogen circuit will cool the cryostat's heat shields and the helium circuit itself. There will also be a water cooling system, which is aimed at lowering the temperature of the blanket walls.
Power supply. The tokamak will require approximately 110 MW of energy to operate continuously. To achieve this, kilometer-long power lines will be installed and connected to the French industrial network. It is worth recalling that the ITER experimental facility does not provide for energy generation, but operates only in scientific interests.

ITER funding

The international thermonuclear reactor ITER is a fairly expensive undertaking, which was initially estimated at $12 billion, with Russia, the USA, Korea, China and India accounting for 1/11 of the amount, Japan for 2/11, and the EU for 4/11 . This amount later increased to $15 billion. It is noteworthy that financing occurs through the supply of equipment required for the complex, which is developed in each country. Thus, Russia supplies blankets, plasma heating devices and superconducting magnets.

Project perspective

At the moment, the construction of the ITER complex and the production of all the required components for the tokamak are underway. After the planned launch of the tokamak in 2025, a series of experiments will begin, based on the results of which aspects that require improvement will be noted. After the successful commissioning of ITER, it is planned to build a power plant based on thermonuclear fusion called DEMO (DEMOnstration Power Plant). DEMo's goal is to demonstrate the so-called "commercial appeal" of fusion power. If ITER is capable of generating only 500 MW of energy, then DEMO will be able to continuously generate energy of 2 GW.

However, it should be borne in mind that the ITER experimental facility will not produce energy, and its purpose is to obtain purely scientific benefits. And as you know, this or that physical experiment can not only meet expectations, but also bring new knowledge and experience to humanity.

Lockheed Martin management announced that in February 2018 it received a patent for a compact fusion reactor. Experts call this impossible, although according to The War Zone, “it is possible that the American corporation will make an official statement in the near future.”

FlightGlobal reporter Stephen Trimble tweeted that “a new patent from a Skunk Works engineer shows a compact fusion reactor design with a blueprint for the F-16 as a potential application. A prototype reactor is being tested in Palmdale.”

According to the publication, "The fact that Skunk Works has remained involved in the patent process over the past four years also seems to indicate that they have indeed made progress with the program, at least to some extent." The authors of the material note that four years ago, the project developers released basic information about the basic design of the reactor, the project schedule and the overall goals of the program, which indicates serious work.

Let us recall that Lockheed Martin filed a provisional application for the patent “Encapsulating magnetic fields for plasma confinement” on April 4, 2013. At the same time, the official application to the US Patent and Trademark Office was received on April 2, 2014.

Lockheed Martin said the patent was received on February 15, 2018. At one time, Compact Fusion project manager Thomas McGuire said that a pilot plant would be created in 2014, a prototype in 2019, and a working prototype in 2024.

The company reports on its website that the thermonuclear reactor, which its specialists are working on, can be used to provide energy to an aircraft carrier, fighter jet or small city.

In October 2014, the corporation said that preliminary research results indicate the possibility of creating light nuclear fusion reactors with a power of about 100 megawatts and dimensions comparable to a truck (which is about ten times smaller than existing models). In essence, we are talking about an application for the discovery of the century - a radiation-safe reactor capable of providing energy to anything.

For their part, Russian scientists involved in research in the field of controlled thermonuclear fusion called the Lockheed Martin message an unscientific statement aimed at attracting the attention of the general public. However, a photo of a compact thermonuclear reactor, supposedly being created by the American corporation Lockheed Martin, appeared on Twitter.

“This can't happen. The fact is that what is meant by a thermonuclear reactor is very well known from a physical point of view. If it sounds “helium 3? - You must immediately understand that this is a deception. This is a characteristic feature of such quasi-discoveries - where there is one line “how to do it, how to implement it” and ten pages about how it will be good afterwards. This is a very characteristic sign - we have invented cold thermonuclear fusion, and then they don’t say how to implement it, and then only ten pages later, how great it will be,” the deputy director of the laboratory told Pravda.ru nuclear reactions them. Flerov JINR in Dubna Andrey Papeko.

“The main question is how to excite a thermonuclear reaction, what to heat it with, what to hold it with - this is also, in general, a question that has not been resolved now. And even, say, laser thermonuclear installations, a normal thermonuclear reaction does not ignite there. And, alas, there is no solution in sight in the foreseeable future,” explained the nuclear physicist.

“Russia is conducting quite a lot of research, this is understandable, it has been published in the entire open press, that is, it is necessary to study the conditions for heating materials for a thermonuclear reaction. In general, this is a mixture with deuterium - there is no science fiction, this physics is all very well known. How to heat it, how to hold it, how to remove energy, if you ignite a very hot plasma, it will eat the walls of the reactor, it will melt them. In large installations, magnetic fields can be used to hold and focus it in the center of the chamber so that it does not melt the walls of the reactor. But in small installations it simply won’t work, it will melt and burn. That is, these, in my opinion, are very premature statements,” he concluded.

Today, many countries are taking part in thermonuclear research. The leaders are the European Union, the United States, Russia and Japan, while programs in China, Brazil, Canada and Korea are rapidly expanding. Initially, fusion reactors in the USA and USSR were associated with the development of nuclear weapons and remained classified until the Atoms for Peace conference, which took place in Geneva in 1958. After the creation of the Soviet tokamak, nuclear fusion research became “big science” in the 1970s. But the cost and complexity of the devices increased to the point where international cooperation became the only way forward.

Thermonuclear reactors in the world

Since the 1970s, the commercial use of fusion energy has been continually delayed by 40 years. However, a lot has happened in recent years that may allow this period to be shortened.

Several tokamaks have been built, including the European JET, the British MAST and the TFTR experimental fusion reactor at Princeton, USA. The international ITER project is currently under construction in Cadarache, France. It will be the largest tokamak when it starts operating in 2020. In 2030, China will build CFETR, which will surpass ITER. Meanwhile, China is conducting research on the experimental superconducting tokamak EAST.

Another type of fusion reactor, stellators, is also popular among researchers. One of the largest, LHD, began work in Japan National Institute in 1998. It is used to find the best magnetic configuration for plasma confinement. The German Max Planck Institute conducted research at the Wendelstein 7-AS reactor in Garching between 1988 and 2002, and currently at the Wendelstein 7-X reactor, whose construction took more than 19 years. Another TJII stellarator is in operation in Madrid, Spain. In the US, Princeton Laboratory (PPPL), which built the first fusion reactor of this type in 1951, stopped construction of NCSX in 2008 due to cost overruns and lack of funding.

In addition, significant advances have been made in inertial fusion research. Construction of the $7 billion National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), funded by the National Nuclear Security Administration, was completed in March 2009. The French Laser Mégajoule (LMJ) began operations in October 2014. Fusion reactors use lasers delivering about 2 million joules of light energy within a few billionths of a second to a target a few millimeters in size to trigger a nuclear fusion reaction. The primary mission of NIF and LMJ is research in support of national military nuclear programs.

ITER

In 1985, the Soviet Union proposed building a next-generation tokamak jointly with Europe, Japan and the United States. The work was carried out under the auspices of the IAEA. Between 1988 and 1990, the first designs for the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor ITER, which also means "path" or "journey" in Latin, were created to prove that fusion could produce more energy than it absorbed. Canada and Kazakhstan also took part, mediated by Euratom and Russia respectively.

Six years later, the ITER board approved the first comprehensive reactor design based on established physics and technology, costing $6 billion. Then the United States withdrew from the consortium, which forced them to halve costs and change the project. The result is ITER-FEAT, which costs $3 billion but achieves self-sustaining response and positive power balance.

In 2003, the United States rejoined the consortium, and China announced its desire to participate. As a result, in mid-2005 the partners agreed to build ITER in Cadarache in the south of France. The EU and France contributed half of the €12.8 billion, while Japan, China, South Korea, the US and Russia contributed 10% each. Japan provided high-tech components, maintained a €1 billion IFMIF facility designed to test materials, and had the right to build the next test reactor. The total cost of ITER includes half the costs for 10 years of construction and half for 20 years of operation. India became the seventh member of ITER at the end of 2005.

Experiments are due to begin in 2018 using hydrogen to avoid activating the magnets. Usage D-T plasma not expected before 2026

ITER's goal is to generate 500 MW (at least for 400 s) using less than 50 MW of input power without generating electricity.

Demo's two-gigawatt demonstration power plant will produce large-scale on an ongoing basis. The Demo's conceptual design will be completed by 2017, with construction beginning in 2024. The launch will take place in 2033.

JET

In 1978 the EU (Euratom, Sweden and Switzerland) started the joint European project JET in the UK. JET is today the largest operating tokamak in the world. A similar JT-60 reactor operates at Japan's National Fusion Institute, but only JET can use deuterium-tritium fuel.

The reactor was launched in 1983, and became the first experiment, which resulted in controlled thermonuclear fusion with a power of up to 16 MW for one second and 5 MW of stable power on deuterium-tritium plasma in November 1991. Many experiments have been conducted to study various schemes heating and other techniques.

Further improvements to the JET involve increasing its power. The MAST compact reactor is being developed together with JET and is part of the ITER project.

K-STAR

K-STAR is a Korean superconducting tokamak from the National Fusion Research Institute (NFRI) in Daejeon, which produced its first plasma in mid-2008. ITER, which is the result of international cooperation. The 1.8 m radius Tokamak is the first reactor to use Nb3Sn superconducting magnets, the same ones planned for ITER. During the first phase, completed by 2012, K-STAR had to prove the viability of the underlying technologies and achieve plasma pulses lasting up to 20 seconds. At the second stage (2013-2017), it is being modernized to study long pulses up to 300 s in H mode and transition to a high-performance AT mode. The goal of the third phase (2018-2023) is to achieve high productivity and efficiency in the long-pulse mode. At stage 4 (2023-2025), DEMO technologies will be tested. The device is not capable of working with tritium and does not use D-T fuel.

K-DEMO

Developed in collaboration with the US Department of Energy's Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and South Korea's NFRI, K-DEMO is intended to be the next step in commercial reactor development beyond ITER, and will be the first power plant capable of generating power into the electrical grid, namely 1 million kW within a few weeks. It will have a diameter of 6.65 m and will have a reproduction zone module created as part of the DEMO project. The Korean Ministry of Education, Science and Technology plans to invest about a trillion Korean won ($941 million) in it.

EAST

China's Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) at the Institute of Physics of China in Hefei created hydrogen plasma at a temperature of 50 million °C and maintained it for 102 s.

TFTR

At the American laboratory PPPL, the experimental fusion reactor TFTR operated from 1982 to 1997. In December 1993, TFTR became the first magnetic tokamak to conduct extensive deuterium-tritium plasma experiments. The following year, the reactor produced a then-record 10.7 MW of controllable power, and in 1995 a temperature record of 510 million °C was reached. However, the facility did not achieve the break-even goal of fusion energy, but successfully met the hardware design goals, making a significant contribution to the development of ITER.

LHD

The LHD at Japan's National Fusion Institute in Toki, Gifu Prefecture, was the largest stellarator in the world. The fusion reactor was launched in 1998 and demonstrated plasma confinement properties comparable to other large facilities. An ion temperature of 13.5 keV (about 160 million °C) and an energy of 1.44 MJ were achieved.

Wendelstein 7-X

After a year of testing, which began in late 2015, helium temperatures briefly reached 1 million °C. In 2016, a hydrogen plasma fusion reactor using 2 MW of power reached a temperature of 80 million °C within a quarter of a second. W7-X is the largest stellarator in the world and is planned to operate continuously for 30 minutes. The cost of the reactor was 1 billion €.

NIF

The National Ignition Facility (NIF) at Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) was completed in March 2009. Using its 192 laser beams, NIF is able to concentrate 60 times more energy than any previous laser system.

Cold fusion

In March 1989, two researchers, American Stanley Pons and British Martin Fleischman, announced that they had launched a simple tabletop cold fusion reactor operating at room temperature. The process involved the electrolysis of heavy water using palladium electrodes on which deuterium nuclei were concentrated to a high density. The researchers say it produced heat that could only be explained in terms of nuclear processes, and there were fusion byproducts including helium, tritium and neutrons. However, other experimenters were unable to repeat this experiment. Most of scientific community does not believe that cold fusion reactors are real.

Low energy nuclear reactions

Initiated by claims of "cold fusion", research has continued in the low-energy field with some empirical support, but not generally accepted scientific explanation. Apparently, weak nuclear interactions are used to create and capture neutrons (and not a powerful force, as in their fusion). Experiments involve hydrogen or deuterium passing through a catalytic layer and reacting with a metal. Researchers report an observed release of energy. The main practical example is the interaction of hydrogen with nickel powder, releasing heat in an amount greater than any chemical reaction can produce.

fusion reactor

Currently being developed. (80s) a device for obtaining energy through reactions of synthesis of light at. nuclei occurring at very high temperatures (=108 K). Basic The requirement that thermonuclear reactions must satisfy is that the energy release as a result of thermonuclear reactions more than compensates for the energy costs from external sources. sources to maintain the reaction.

There are two types of T. r. The first type includes TR, to-Crimea is necessary from external. sources only for ignition of thermonuclear fusions. reactions. Further reactions are supported by the energy released in the plasma during fusion. reactions; for example, in a deuterium-tritium mixture, the energy of a-particles formed during reactions is consumed to maintain a high plasma temperature. In stationary operating mode T.r. the energy carried by a-particles compensates for the energy. losses from the plasma, mainly due to thermal conductivity of the plasma and radiation. To this type of T. r. applies, for example, .

To other type of T. r. Reactors include reactors in which the energy released in the form of a-particles is not enough to maintain the combustion of reactions, but energy from external sources is required. sources. This happens in those reactors in which the energy levels are high. losses, e.g. open magnetic trap.

T.r. can be built on the basis of systems with magnetic. plasma confinement, such as tokamak, open magnetic. trap, etc., or systems with inertial plasma confinement, when energy is introduced into the plasma in a short time (10-8-10-7 s) (either using laser radiation, or using beams of relative electrons or ions), sufficient for the occurrence and maintenance of reactions. T.r. with magnetic plasma confinement can operate in quasi-stationary or stationary modes. In the case of inertial plasma confinement T. r. must operate in short pulse mode.

T.r. characterized by coefficient. power amplification (quality factor) Q, equal to the ratio of the thermal power obtained in the reactor to the power cost of its production. Thermal T.r. consists of the power released during fusion. reactions in plasma, and the power released in the so-called. TR blanket - a special shell surrounding the plasma, which uses the energy of thermonuclear nuclei and neutrons. The most promising technology appears to be one that operates on a deuterium-tritium mixture due to the higher reaction rate than other fusion reactions.

T.r. on deuterium-tritium fuel, depending on the composition of the blanket, it can be “pure” or hybrid. Blanket of “pure” T. r. contains Li; in it, under the influence of neutrons, it is produced that “burns” in the deuterium-tritium plasma, and the energy of the thermonuclears increases. reactions from 17.6 to 22.4 MeV. In the blanket of a hybrid T. r. Not only is tritium produced, but there are zones in which, when 238U is placed in them, 239Pu can be obtained (see NUCLEAR REACTOR). At the same time, energy is released in the blanket equal to approx. 140 MeV per one thermonuclear. . Thus, in hybrid T. r. it is possible to obtain approximately six times more energy than in a “pure” nuclear reactor, but the presence of fissile radioacts in the former. in-in creates an environment close to the one in which there is poison. fission reactors.

Physical encyclopedic Dictionary. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia. Editor-in-chief A. M. Prokhorov. 1983 .

fusion reactor

Developed in the 1990s. a device for obtaining energy through fusion reactions of light atomic nuclei occurring in plasma at very high temperatures (10 8 K). Basic The requirement that T.R. must satisfy is that the energy release as a result thermonuclear reactions(TP) more than compensated for energy costs from external sources. sources to maintain the reaction.

There are two types of T. r. The first includes reactors, which generate energy from external sources. sources is only necessary for ignition of TP. Further reactions are supported by the energy released in the plasma at TP, for example. in a deuterium-tritium mixture, the energy of a-particles formed during reactions is consumed to maintain a high temperature. In a mixture of deuterium with 3 He, the energy of all reaction products, i.e. a-particles and protons, is spent on maintaining the required plasma temperature. In stationary operating mode T.r. energy that carries a charge. reaction products, compensates for energy. losses from plasma caused mainly by plasma thermal conductivity and radiation. Such reactors are called reactors with ignition of a self-sustaining thermonuclear reaction (see. Ignition criterion). An example of such a T.r.: tokamak, stellarator.

To other types of T. r. Reactors include reactors in which the energy released in the plasma in the form of charges is insufficient to maintain the combustion of reactions. reaction products, but energy is needed from external sources. sources. Such reactors are usually called reactors supporting the combustion of thermonuclear reactions. This happens in those T. rivers where the energy is high. losses, e.g. open mag. trap, tokamak, operating in a mode with plasma density and temperature below the ignition curve TP. These two types of reactors include all possible types of T. r., which can be built on the basis of systems with magnetic. plasma confinement (tokamak, stellarator, open magnetic trap, etc.) or systems with inertial hold plasma.

International thermonuclear experimental reactor ITER: 1 - central; 2 - blanket - ; 3 - plasma; 4 - vacuum wall; 5 - pumping pipeline; 6- cryostat; 7- active control coils; 8 - toroidal magnetic field coils; 9 - first wall; 10 - divertor plates; 11 - poloidal magnetic field coils.

A reactor with inertial plasma confinement is characterized by the fact that in a short time (10 -8 -10 -7 s) energy is introduced into it using either laser radiation or beams of relativistic electrons or ions, sufficient for the occurrence and maintenance of TP. Such a reactor will only operate in short pulse mode, unlike a reactor with a magnet. plasma confinement, which can operate in quasi-stationary or even stationary modes.

T.r. characterized by coefficient. power gain (quality factor) Q, equal to the ratio of the thermal power of the reactor to the power costs of its production. The thermal power of the reactor consists of the power released during TP in the plasma, the power introduced into the plasma to maintain the combustion temperature TP or maintain a stationary current in the plasma in the case of a tokamak, and the power released in the plasma.

Development of T.r. with magnetic retention is more advanced than inertial retention systems. Scheme of the International Thermonuclear Experiment. The ITER tokamak reactor, a project which has been developed since 1988 by four parties - the USSR (since 1992 Russia), the USA, the Euratom countries and Japan, is presented in the figure. T.r. It has . parameters: large plasma radius 8.1 m; small plasma radius in avg. plane 3 m; plasma cross-section elongation 1.6; toroidal mag. on axis 5.7 Tesla; rated plasma 21 MA; rated thermonuclear power with DT fuel 1500 MW. The reactor contains trace. basic nodes: center. solenoid I, electric the field of which carries out, regulates the increase in current and maintains it together with special. system will be supplemented plasma heating; first wall 9, the edges are directly facing the plasma and perceive heat flows in the form of radiation and neutral particles; blanket - protection 2, which phenomena an integral part of T. r. on deuterium-tri-tium (DT) fuel, since the tritium burned in the plasma is reproduced in the blanket. T.r. on DT fuel, depending on the material of the blanket, it can be “pure” or hybrid. Blanket of "pure" T. r. contains Li; in it, under the influence of thermonuclear neutrons, tritium is produced: 6 Li +nT+ 4 He+ 4.8 MeV, and the TP energy increases from 17.6 MeV to 22.4 MeV. In the blank hybrid fusion reactor Not only is tritium produced, but there are zones in which waste 238 U is placed to produce 239 Pu. At the same time, energy equal to 140 MeV per thermonuclear neutron is released in the blanket. T. o., in a hybrid T. r. it is possible to obtain approximately six times more energy per initial fusion event than in “pure” T.R., but the presence in the first case of fissile radioacts. substances creates radiation. an environment similar to that of heaven that exists in nuclear reactors division.

In T.r. with fuel on a mixture of D with 3 He, there is no blanket, since there is no need to reproduce tritium: D + 3 He 4 He (3.6 MeV) + p (14.7 MeV), and all the energy is released in the form of charge. reaction products. Radiation The protection is designed to absorb the energy of neutrons and radioactive acts. radiation and reduction of heat and radiation flows to the superconducting magnet. system to a level acceptable for stationary operation. Toroidal magnet coils fields 8 serve to create a toroidal magnet. fields and are made superconducting using an Nb 3 Sn superconductor and a copper matrix operating at the temperature of liquid helium (4.2 K). The development of technology for obtaining high-temperature superconductivity may make it possible to eliminate the cooling of coils with liquid helium and switch to a cheaper cooling method, for example. liquid nitrogen. The design of the reactor will not change significantly. Poloidal field coils 11 are also superconducting and, together with magnesium. the plasma current field creates an equilibrium configuration of the poloidal magnetic field. fields with one or two-zero poloidal d i v e r t o r 10, serving to remove heat from the plasma in the form of a flow of charges. particles and for pumping out reaction products neutralized on the divertor plates: helium and protium. In T.r. with D 3 He fuel, divertor plates can serve as one of the elements of the direct charge energy conversion system. reaction products into electricity. Cryostat 6 serves to cool superconducting coils to the temperature of liquid helium or higher temperatures when using more advanced high-temperature superconductors. Vacuum chamber 4 and pumping means 5 are designed to obtain a high vacuum in the working chamber of the reactor, in which plasma is created 3, and in all auxiliary volumes, including the cryostat.

As a first step towards the creation of thermonuclear energy, a thermonuclear reactor is proposed that operates on a DT mixture due to the higher reaction rate than other fusion reactions. In the future, the possibility of creating a low-radioactive T. r. is being considered. on a mixture of D with 3 He, in which bas. energy carries a charge. reaction products, and neutrons appear only in DD and DT reactions during the burnout of tritium generated in DD reactions. As a result, biol. danger T. r. may apparently be reduced by four to five orders of magnitude compared to nuclear reactors division, there is no need for industrial radioact processing materials and their transportation, the disposal of radioactive materials is qualitatively simplified. waste. However, the prospects for creating an environmentally friendly TR in the future. on a mixture of D with 3 Not complicated by the problem of raw materials: natural. concentrations of the 3 He isotope on Earth are parts per million of the 4 He isotope. Therefore, the difficult question of obtaining raw materials arises, e.g. by delivering it from the Moon.