DEAR0001995

This cooperative agreement is awarded to Exofusion, Inc. for a project entitled, ''Novel Liquid Metal Plasma Facing Component Alloys”.

This award is being made in accordance with FOA number DE-FOA-0003240 (Chadwick) and application control number 3240-1549.

The applicant proposes the development of new materials that, for the first time, have properties tailored to optimize the core confinement and divertor plasma performance while being able to perform the functions of a PFC in an FPP environment.

Core confinement is the single largest cost driver of an FPP (according to recent studies), so this is extremely important to an economic FPP.

The PFC material has an enormous impact upon core confinement, as we will see.

Solid W and liquid Li likely have serious problems with core-edge integration, which will ultimately manifest in lowered confinement.

This can be remedied by the new materials here.

The applicant also proposes a novel class of liquid metals (LMS) to enable core edge integration, having 1) unique chemistry (as per the FOA) to segregate low Z to the surface of high Z bulk, so plasma material interaction (PMI) is optimized and 2) properties to encourage the very strong divertor heat flux mitigation required for an FPP.

Exofusion

THE PRIMARY OBJECTIVE OF THE CHADWICK PROGRAM IS THE DEVELOPMENT OF NEW FIRST-WALL MATERIALS THAT WILL SIGNIFICANTLY IMPROVE THE COMMERCIAL VIABILITY OF NUCLEAR FUSION. COMMERCIAL MATERIALS WITH KNOWN HIGH-TEMPERATURE RESISTANCE WILL OFTEN SEE SEVERE EMBRITTLEMENT AND SWELLING UNDER IRRADIATION.10 MATERIALS THAT EXHIBIT HIGH IRRADIATION RESISTANCE MAY SHOW LOW THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY OR HIGH ACTIVATION. FINDING A MATERIAL THAT HAS THE MOST OPTIMIZED PERFORMANCE FOR A FUSION FIRST WALL IS A MAJOR SCIENTIFIC AND ENGINEERING CHALLENGE. THE MULTI-OBJECTIVE OPTIMIZATION OF NEW MATERIALS WILL CHALLENGE THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY TO USE THE LATEST TOOLS TO SOLVE THE LONGSTANDING PROBLEM OF FINDING A MATERIAL THAT CAN SURVIVE IN A FUSION ENVIRONMENT.

81.135 - Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy

Advanced Research Projects Agency - Energy (ARPA-E) [DOE]

Bellevue, Washington United States

City-Wide

Creating Hardened and Durable Fusion First Wall Incorporating Centralized Knowledge (CHADWICK) (DE-FOA-0003240)