Engineering Services for the Design and Analysis of the European TBMs in ITER
France
Europe is developing two reference tritium breeder blanket concepts that will be tested in ITER (International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor) under the form of Test Blanket Modules (TBMs): the Helium-Cooled Lithium-Lead (HCLL) and the Helium-Cooled Pebble-Bed (HCPB). IDOM is working in collaboration with Fusion for Energy in the study of the technical feasibility of new TBM (Test Blanket Modules), HCLL (Helium-Cooled Lithium Lead) and HCPB (Helium-Cooled Pebble-Bed), concepts in order to reduce their ferritic martensitic steel content, since recent studies have shown that a significant presence of ferromagnetic material within the vacuum vessel could hinder the accomplishment of certain plasma control objectives in ITER.
The Helium-Cooled Lithium-Lead (HCLL) which uses the liquid Pb-16Li as both breeder and neutron multiplier, and the Helium-Cooled Pebble-Bed (HCPB) with lithiated ceramic pebbles as breeder and beryllium pebbles as neutron multiplier are using the EUROFER reduced activation ferritic-martensitic steel as structural material and pressurized helium technology for heat extraction.
Several tasks have been undertaken for the thermomechanical and thermohydraulic design and analyses of the TBMs under thermal, internal pressure and seismic loads.
Within F4E-GRT-288, the final goal of the work was to perform a preliminary assessment on the feasibility of three different, alternative configurations of TBM which significantly reduce or even eliminate the amount of Eurofer97 (ferritic martensitic steel). In the context of contract F4E-2008-OPE-011-01-01-16, preliminary analyses in order to assess the seismic response of the TBM set were carried out in ANSYS. All these works were to be extended in the context of contract F4E-OMF-331-01-01, where some new advanced analysis methodologies are to be implemented.
Several FE models have been generated in the context of these works, but could be generally split into two groups: those developed for the analysis of the effects at a local TBM level of internal pressure and transient thermal loads, and that developed at a global TBM set + Port Plug Frame + VV equatorial port level for the assessment of gravity and seismic loads. A wide range of analyses have been conducted scoping even complex transient thermomechanical analyses.
