ITER Requirements for Analysis and Validation

The ITER Organization has initiated the process of assessing issues and requirements for data analysis and modeling for the operational program. Many of these requirements are consistent with those currently in research programs in the member countries. ITER will, however, rely more heavily on model predictions to design and develop the pulse sequences used during operations. This places a greater demand on the fidelity of the models and on their experimental validation. Real-time data analysis will be an integral component of the ITER plasma control system. Real-time forecasting of discharge evolution, identification of the approach to operational limits, and disruption avoidance strategies are included in the overall strategy for control and analysis. Because of the long ITER pulse length, we require display of analyzed data and model predictions during the execution of each pulse as the data are being acquired and processed. An integrated modeling and data analysis system with unified methods for data handling and storage will be designed and developed.