On the path to fusion electricity over the past 10-15 years, while the ITER construction has been going on, progress in performance improvements in tokamaks has been rather modest. A possible reason for this is the shortage of ITER-relevant innovations in physics and technology that would be compatible with the traditional approach where the increase in the physical size of the fusion device is considered as the main driver for scientific and technological progress. Innovations are indeed easier to test and use in smaller devices that are also cheaper and quicker to build. The talk discusses such an alternative path to fusion electricity which is based on a compact high-field spherical tokamak approach followed by Tokamak Energy. Among the key fusion technologies discussed are high temperature superconducting magnets and fusion reactor materials.
Speakers
Dr Mikhail Gryaznevich who is the founder, the Chief Scientist and a member of the executive board of Tokamak Energy.