5-9 September 2016
Prague Congress Centre
Europe/Prague timezone

O5B.4 Multi-section Traveling Wave Antenna for heating of large machines as DEMO

8 Sep 2016, 17:40
20m
Meeting Hall I 1st floor (Prague Congress Centre)

Meeting Hall I 1st floor

Prague Congress Centre

5. května 65, Prague, Czech Republic
Board: 4
Oral B. Plasma Heating and Current Drive O5B

Speaker

Riccardo Ragona (Laboratory for Plasma Physics)

Description

The main advantages of Ion Cyclotron Resonance Heating and Current Drive (ICRH&CD) are its ability to achieve power deposition in the centre of the plasma column without any density limit along with direct heating of plasma ions. The challenge is then to couple large amount of power through the plasma boundary, where an evanesence layer has to be crossed, without exceeding the voltage standoff at the antenna. A solution presently considered is the reduction of the power density by means of antennas distributed all along the wall of the machine. In reference [1] we have shown that a suitable launcher can be constituted by sections of Travelling Wave Antenna (TWA) mounted in resonant ring systems. They are launching a traveling wave in one direction along the structure that leaks its energy to the plasma and it is refilled periodically by generators. Each section is constituted by a series of equidistant mutually coupled grounded straps aligned in the poloidal direction which radiates its power to the plasma proportionally to the total strap number divided by their inter-strap distance. Due to the large number of radiating elements, the launched power spectrum is very selective. A detailed discussion on the multi-section antenna is made in view of its test on a mock-up. We study the influence of its geometrical parameters on its response along with the influence of the periodicity of the sections and the feedings. This extends the work done in [2]. The aim is to prepare for a proof-of-concept system to be tested in an operating tokamak machine. [1] R. Ragona and A. Messiaen, submitted for publication (2016). [2] A. Messiaen and R. Ragona, EPS Conf. 2016 This work has received funding from the Euratom research and training programme 2014-2018 under grant agreement No 633053.

Co-authors

Andre Messiaen (Laboratory for Plasma Physics, Royal Military Academy LPP-ERM/KMS, B-1000 Bruxelles, Belgium) Riccardo Ragona (Laboratory for Plasma Physics, Royal Military Academy LPP-ERM/KMS, B-1000 Bruxelles, Belgium;Department of Applied Physics, Ghent University, 9000 Ghent, Belgium)

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