Patrick White
MIT
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
5:00pm
The successful commercialization of fusion energy will require the development or adoption of design evaluation methods to assess the safety of fusion facilities and regulatory frameworks to oversee design and operation. The design evaluation methods and regulatory frameworks selected for commercial fusion will have a significant impact on the both the physical design and economic viability of future facilities. Understanding these impacts, and selecting appropriate methods and frameworks will be one of the keys to the successful development and deployment of fusion energy. In this talk, we will identify major offsite hazards of commercial-scale fusion and estimate the potential offsite consequences of worst-case releases of tritium. The use of different design and analysis methods to reduce these consequences to acceptable levels will be presented in the context of their compatibility with common design evaluation methods. Finally, impacts of these design evaluation methods on potential regulatory frameworks and overall licensing burden for commercial fusion will be discussed.
Plasma Science and Fusion Center
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
77 Massachusetts Avenue, NW17
Cambridge, MA 02139
info@psfc.mit.edu
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