PSFC Seminar: D-T fuel cycles: Achieving tritium self-sufficiency in fusion power plants

Samuele Meschini

MIT PSFC

Friday, September 27, 2024

2:00pm

NW17-218 Hybrid

PSFC Seminars

Abstract: Achieving tritium self-sufficiency is one of the greatest challenges in fusion power plant (FPP) design. Fuel cycles are highly integrated systems with interfaces involving the plasma, primary cooling system, neutron shielding, and safety systems. The required tritium breeding ratio (TBRr) and tritium inventories of an FPP strongly depend on the fuel cycle dynamics, plasma operations, and design goals.

In this seminar, I will give an overview of fuel cycle design and present a dynamic, system-level model of D-T fuel cycles to assess tritium self-sufficiency for selected designs. We will also investigate the impact of material damage and tritium trapping on TBRr  and inventories, which has never been addressed in the literature at a system-level scale. Lastly, several tritium management strategies and the development of critical technologies will be presented as key paths to achieve tritium self-sufficiency in FPPs.

Bio: Samuele Meschini got his Bachelor in Energy engineering at Polytechnic University of Turin, his Master in Nuclear Engineering at Polytechnic University of Turin and Polytechnic University of Milan within the joint project POLY2NUC, and his PhD in Energetics at the Polytechnic University of Turin with a thesis on safety analysis of ARC-class tokamaks. He also worked on various projects on DEMO and DTT involving fuel cycle and safety analysis.

Currently, he is a postdoc at MIT PSFC working on fuel cycle modeling and analysis.