A Self-Cooled Liquid Breeder Blanket for a Laser IFE Power Plant with Magnetic Intervention

A possible way to address the issue of dry wall survival in a Laser IFE chamber is to use magnetic diversion in order to steer away the ions from the chamber wall (representing ~25-30% of the yield energy). A cusp magnetic field is imposed on to the chamber; the ions from the micro-explosion are trapped within the magnetic field and are directed to more readily accessible and replaceable dump regions at the equator and poles. A large fraction of the magnetic energy can be dissipated in the chamber walls if an electrically resistive structural material is used. An advanced blanket based on a self-cooled liquid breeder (e.g.Pb-17Li or flibe) and SiC_f/SiC structure has been proposed for this purpose and a scoping design study performed as part of the High Average Power Laser program effort.

This paper summarizes the results of this scoping study, and highlights the advantages of such a concept as well as the key issues that need to be addressed by R&D.