In ITER, the 'Pipe Forest (PF)' is a network of pipes that connects the Ancillary Equipment Unit to the Test Blanket Module (TBM) at the level of the equatorial port-plug of the reactor prototype. The goal of ITER's TBM program is to validate concepts to be adopted for the DEMO tritium Breeding Blankets. Different types of pipes are mounted on the port-plug among which those used for cooling or tritium processing. During plasma operation, the PF has to accommodate severe thermomechanical loads. It shall also provide protection from abnormal contamination and be designed to ease connection/disconnection operations. With numerical simulation, this work assesses the use of bolted flanges as an alternative to the welded solution to connect the PF on the TBMs inside the port cell environment. The proposed designs integrate metallic seals as well as an embedded cooling system in the flanges when necessary, to limit the temperature of the seals and the bolts and prevent irreversible damage. It is shown that bolted-flange junctions for the PF are a credible solution. Still, important stresses in the socket of the flanges are present but do not represent a problematic issue for dimensioning purposes, as they shall be accommodated with a small amount of plastic strain.
The objective of the ITER test blanket module (TBM) program is to provide experimental data on the performance of the breeding blankets in the integrated fusion nuclear environment. The ITER test blanket modules are installed and operated inside the vacuum vessel (VV) at the equatorial ports located within port plugs (PP), and each PP includes two TBMs. After each 18-month-long plasma operation campaign, the TBM research plan testing program requires the replacement of the TBMs with new ones during the ITER long-term shutdown, called long-term maintenance (LTM). The replacement of a TBM requires the removal/reinstallation of all test blanket system (TBS) equipment present in the port cell (PC), including those in the port interspace (PI), called pipe forest (PF). TBSs shall be designed so that occupational radiation exposure (ORE) can be as low as reasonably achievable (ALARA) over the life of the plant to follow the ITER policy. To implement ALARA process requirements, design activities shall consider careful integration investigations starting from the early phase to address all engineering aspects of the replacement sequence. The case study focuses on the PF replacement, in particular the port cell operations. This paper describes the investigations and findings of the ALARA optimisation process implementation in the early engineering phase of the PF.
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