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ICF Reactor Economics: Identifying the High Leverage Design Features

Wayne R. Meier, William J. Hogan

Fusion Science and Technology / Volume 8 / Number 1P2B / July 1985 / Pages 1820-1825

Inertial Confinement Fusion Reactor / Proceedings of the Sixth Topical Meeting on the Technology of Fusion Energy (San Francisco, California, March 3-7, 1985) / dx.doi.org/10.13182/FST85-A40025

Parametric studies were carried out for a heavy ion beam (HIB) fusion electric power plant to investigate the effects on the cost of electricity (COE) of variations in several design parameters. In particular, we examined the effects of maximum achievable chamber pulse rate, driver cost, target gain, electric conversion efficiency, and net electric power. We find that with a combination of improvements over our base case, HIB fusion can be economically competitive with other future power sources.