Ultra Low Pressure-Drop Helium-Cooled Porous-Tungsten PFC

A new class of helium-cooled high heat-flux plasma facing heat exchanger (HX) concept is presented. These unique "Foam-In-Tube" HX concepts are composed of a thin tungsten shell integrally bonded to an open-cell tungsten foam core. High heat flux tests show maximum heat loads of 22.4 MW/m² using 4 MPa helium at a flow rate of 27 g/s. Based on these impressive performance results, a unique and scalable heat exchanger channel with ultra-low pressure drop through the porous foam is presented. The primary advantage of the new concept is that pressure drop through the porous media and structure temperatures are nearly independent of HX tube length. The concept is modular in design and can be combined to meet divertor size requirements. From a manufacturing and reliability point of view, the advantage of the proposed concept is that it minimizes the need for joining to other functional materials.