Preliminary Studies of Direct Energy Conversion in a D-³He Inertial Confinement Fusion Reactor

A direct energy conversion method is proposed for a D-³He inertial confinement fusion reactor. The method utilizes inductive energy recovery through pickup coils in the plasma chamber in which mirror magnetic fields are applied. A method to reduce the problems regarding the handling of ultrahigh voltage inherent in energy recovery of this type is proposed that divides a one-turn pickup coil into a number of pickup segments both axially and azimuthally to reduce the output voltage per pickup segment so that it can be managed by near-term technologies. Analytical results predict that the expanding plasma energy is directly converted to electricity through the recovery circuit using capacitors with an efficiency of >80% when the plasma is assumed to expand cylindrically.