Controlled Nuclear Fusion Current Research and Potential Progress (1978) / Chapter Skim
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APPENDIX: FUSION-FISSION HYBRID AND ACCELERATOR BREEDING CONCEPTS
APPENDIX: FUSION-FISSION HYBRID AND ACCELERATOR BREEDING CONCEPTS
Pages 45-55
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From page 45... ...
Specifically, a fundamental obstacle to the commercialization of fusion reactors is the wellknown difficulty of achieving acceptable capacity factors in complex plants which are also radioactive. The addition of a highly radioactive fission breeding blanket of necessarily inconvenient geometry thus appears to be diametrically opposed to the requirements for early commercialization.
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From page 46... ...
It hence appears plausible that enough energy gain can be achieved to more than make up for the 30 to 40 percent efficiency of converting heat to electricity and the 50 percent efficiency of converting bus-bar electricity to accelerator beam power. In both fusion-fission hybrids and accelerator breeders, the ratio of in situ burning of fissile material to burning in separate fission reactors is an adjustable system design parameter.
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From page 47... ...
Furthermore the philosophical advantages of fusionfission hybrids over fission breeders or near breeders do not appear crucial in a practical sense so that the advances in nuclear technology required for the commercialization of fusion-fission hybrids would be likely to benefit competing pure fission concepts to a comparable extent. (For example, the problems in commercialization of the light water breeder reactor relate to the need for inconveniently large pressure vessels, internal structural complexity, and poor power distributions.
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From page 48... ...
In addition, different investigators have selected their own preferred fission reactor concept as the basis for blanket design. Accelerator breeder concepts are generally based on the use of linear accelerators, but differnt ions (e.g., protons, deuterons, or tritons)
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From page 49... ...
The estimates of MeV of energy associated with the net production of one atom of fissile material are also subject to substantial uncertainty. While the cost estimates are of little quantitative significance, they are at least consistent with the general belief that accelerator breeders might produce fissile material in the cost range of $l00 to $300 per gram; fusion-fission hybrids, if they were technologically feasible, could conceivably produce fissile material at about half this cost.
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From page 50... ...
In the first instance, fusion-fission hybrids and accelerator breeders are copious neutron producers and thus in themselves provide avenues for proliferation. For example, if the technologies of fusionfission devices or high-power linear accelerators turn out to be sufficiently tractable for commercial use, then coupling such a device to a slightly subcritical lattic of natural uranium and light water would presumably provide a tempting avenue for generating fissile isotopes and thermonuclear materials.
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From page 51... ...
TABLE l Conjectural Cost of Fissile Material Production by Fusion Hybrid and Spallation Schemes Break-Even Fusion Low Exposure Blanket High Exposure Blanket Spallation Breeding Low Exposure Target High Exposure Target Electrical Input: MeV/net fissile atom $/net gram of fissile product Plant Cost Allocated to Blanket or Target (Based on heat removal requirement) : MeV of heat/net fissile atom $net gram of fissile product Plant Cost Allocated to Fusion Device or Accelerator and RF Power Supply: Capital cost of equipment (3000 g/day plant)
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From page 52... ...
: 5 percent of plant costs per annum Total Plant Cost Allocated to the blanket or target (including heat removal) : $200/kW thermal Net Thermal Efficiency of Electrical Generation: 33 percent Total Plant Cost Allocated to Electrical Power Generation: $300/kW electric Capital Cost of 300 Megawatt RF Power Supply and Accelerator (3000 gms/ day production with low exposure blanket)
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From page 53... ...
March l977. The EPRI Asilomar Papers: On the Possibility of Advanced Fuel Fusion Reactors, FusionFission Hybrid Breeders, Small Fusion Power Reactors.
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From page 54... ...
Progress toward the Development of a Mirror Hybrid Fusion-Fission Reactor, Pacific Northwest Laboratory, Richland, Wash.
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