Fusion energy has developed considerably over the past 50 years. Now the UKAEA’s Lithium Breeding Tritium Innovation (LIBRTI) programme aims to foster world-leading innovation for fusion powerplant fuel cycle development, while stimulating industry capability and capacity.
The LIBRTI programme has been designed to help industry achieve demonstrations of controlled tritium breeding, a first step towards a predictable, controllable way of generating the fuel required within a self-sustaining fusion fuel cycle. Tritium is deployed as a primary fuel in fusion energy machines as it reacts with deuterium (D-T reaction) to create neutrons. Other forms of fusion are possible, but the D-T reaction maximises the amount of energy generated in the fusion technologies available today. However, tritium is extremely rare in nature. It is therefore necessary to develop a self-sustaining fuel cycle in any future fusion powerplant. The first step will be to help industry establish feasible engineering-scale tritium breeder blanket prototypes.
LIBRTI will deliver a first-of-a-kind testbed facility on the Culham Campus, containing a neutron source, which will produce neutrons to react with the lithium contained in different types of prototype blankets to produce tritium. The facility will include space to assemble and dissemble the large-scale tritium breeding experiments, and to capture the knowledge gained from the research.
In addition, the programme will establish a digital simulation capability and skills to model solid, liquid and molten salt breeder technologies, to predict tritium breeding performance, analyse experimental results and provide guidance for future design development of breeder blankets ideas. This will be an in-silico replication of the physical experiment utilising the multiphysics models of tritium breeding, which will be a stepping stone for industry towards the qualification of breeders.
Speaking about the programme, Amanda Quadling, Executive Director for Blankets, Materials and Research and Senior Responsible Officer for LIBRTI says:
“We aim to move from a science experiment and progression of science knowledge to a sense of confidence that the supply chain is capable of producing the subsystems required for future powerplants. The digital platform is a very powerful way of being able to design future breeders in industry.”
Fusion energy has developed considerably over the past 50 years. Now the UKAEA’s Lithium Breeding Tritium Innovation (LIBRTI) programme aims to foster world-leading innovation for fusion powerplant fuel cycle development, while stimulating industry capability and capacity.
The LIBRTI programme has been designed to help industry achieve demonstrations of controlled tritium breeding, a first step towards a predictable, controllable way of generating the fuel required within a self-sustaining fusion fuel cycle. Tritium is deployed as a primary fuel in fusion energy machines as it reacts with deuterium (D-T reaction) to create neutrons. Other forms of fusion are possible, but the D-T reaction maximises the amount of energy generated in the fusion technologies available today. However, tritium is extremely rare in nature. It is therefore necessary to develop a self-sustaining fuel cycle in any future fusion powerplant. The first step will be to help industry establish feasible engineering-scale tritium breeder blanket prototypes.
LIBRTI will deliver a first-of-a-kind testbed facility on the Culham Campus, containing a neutron source, which will produce neutrons to react with the lithium contained in different types of prototype blankets to produce tritium. The facility will include space to assemble and dissemble the large-scale tritium breeding experiments, and to capture the knowledge gained from the research.
In addition, the programme will establish a digital simulation capability and skills to model solid, liquid and molten salt breeder technologies, to predict tritium breeding performance, analyse experimental results and provide guidance for future design development of breeder blankets ideas. This will be an in-silico replication of the physical experiment utilising the multiphysics models of tritium breeding, which will be a stepping stone for industry towards the qualification of breeders.
Speaking about the programme, Amanda Quadling, Executive Director for Blankets, Materials and Research and Senior Responsible Officer for LIBRTI says:
“We aim to move from a science experiment and progression of science knowledge to a sense of confidence that the supply chain is capable of producing the subsystems required for future powerplants. The digital platform is a very powerful way of being able to design future breeders in industry.”
Image credit: ITER Tokamak visual