Study on Multiphysics Coupling and Automatic Neutronic Optimization for Solid Tritium Breeding Blanket of Fusion Reactor

Abstract

A tritium breeding blanket (TBB) is an essential component in a fusion reactor, which has functions of tritium breeding, energy generation and neutron shielding. Tritium breeding ratio (TBR) is a key parameter to evaluate whether the TBB could produce enough tritium to achieve tritium self-sufficiency (TBR > 1) for a fusion reactor. Current codes or software struggle to meet the requirements of high efficiency and high automation for neutronic optimization of the TBB. In this paper, the multiphysics coupling and automatic neutronic optimization method study for a solid breeder TBB is performed, and a corresponding code is developed. A typical module of China fusion engineering test reactor (CFETR) helium cooled ceramic breeder (HCCB) TBB was selected, and a 3D neutronics model of an initial scheme is developed. The automatic neutronic optimization was performed by using the developed code for verification. Results indicate that the TBR could increase from 1.219 to 1.282 (~5.17% improvement), and that the maximum temperature of each type of material in the optimized scheme is below the allowable temperature. It is of great scientific significance and engineering value to explore and study the algorithm for automatic neutronic optimization and the code development of the TBB.

Neutronics Perturbation Calculation Method Study of Solid Breeder Tritium Breeding Blanket for TBR Enhancement

“…Consequently, neutronic optimization study toward the solid breeder TBB is imperative in blanket design, which is a process to enhance the TBR (by means of density and geometric adjustments) as much as possible on the basis of engineering feasibilities (Qu et al, 2021). The current neutronic optimization methods are based on multiple neutronic transport calculation.…”