Engineering options for the US Fusion Demo

Through its successful operation, the US Fusion Demo must be sufficiently convincing that a utility or independent power producer will choose to purchase one as its next electric generating plant. A fusion power plant which is limited to the use of currently-proven technologies is unlikely to be sufficiently attractive to a utility unless fuel shortages and regulatory restrictions are far more crippling to competing energy sources than currently anticipated. In that case, the task of choosing an appropriate set of engineering technologies today involves trade-offs between attractiveness and technical risk. The design space for an attractive tokamak fusion power core is not unlimited; previous studies have shown that advanced low-activation ferritic steel, vanadium alloy, or SiC/SiC composites are the only candidates we have for the primary in-vessel structural material. An assessment of engineering design options has been performed using these three materials and the associated in-vessel component designs which are compatible with them.