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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

Committee on the Key Goals and Innovation Needed for a U.S. Fusion Pilot Plant
Board on Physics and Astronomy
Board on Energy and Environmental Systems
Division on Engineering and Physical Sciences
Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board
Division on Earth and Life Studies
National Academy of Engineering Office of Programs
A Consensus Study Report of

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This study is based on work supported by Contract DE-SC0020922 with the Department of Energy. Any
opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication do not necessarilyreflect the views of any agency or organization that provided support for the project.
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The National Academy of Sciences was established in 1863 by an Act of Congress,
signed by President Lincoln, as a private, nongovernmental institution to advise thenation on issues related to science and technology. Members are elected by theirpeers for outstanding contributions to research. Dr. Marcia McNutt is president.
The National Academy of Engineering was established in 1964 under the charter of
the National Academy of Sciences to bring the practices of engineering to advising thenation. Members are elected by their peers for extraordinary contributions toengineering. Dr. John L. Anderson is president.
The National Academy of Medicine (formerly the Institute of Medicine) wasestablished in 1970 under the charter of the National Academy of Sciences to advise
the nation on medical and health issues. Members are elected by their peers for
distinguished contributions to medicine and health. Dr. Victor J. Dzau is president.
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Learn more about the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine atwww.nationalacademies.org.

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Consensus Study Reports published by the National Academies of Sciences,
Engineering, and Medicine document the evidence-based consensus on the study’s
statement of task by an authoring committee of experts. Reports typically include
findings, conclusions, and recommendations based on information gathered by thecommittee and the committee’s deliberations. Each report has been subjected to arigorous and independent peer-review process and it represents the position of the
National Academies on the statement of task.
Proceedings published by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, andMedicine chronicle the presentations and discussions at a workshop, symposium, orother event convened by the National Academies. The statements and opinions
contained in proceedings are those of the participants and are not endorsed by otherparticipants, the planning committee, or the National Academies.
For information about other products and activities of the National Academies, please
visit www.nationalacademies.org/about/whatwedo.

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COMMITTEE ON THE KEY GOALS AND INNOVATION NEEDEDFOR A U.S. FUSION PILOT PLANT
RICARD J. HAWRYLUK, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, Chair
BRENDA L. GARCIA-DIAZ, Savannah River National Laboratory
GERALD L. KULCINSKI, NAE, 1 University of Wisconsin, Madison
KATHRYN A. MCCARTHY, NAE, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
PER F. PETERSON, NAE, University of California, Berkeley
JEFFREY P. QUINTENZ, TechSource, Inc.
WANDA REDER, NAE, Grid-X Partners, LLC
DAVID ROOP, NAE, DWR Associates, LLC
PHILIP SNYDER, General Atomics
JENNIFER L. ULHE, Nuclear Energy Institute
DENNIS G. WHYTE, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
BRIAN D. WIRTH, University of Tennessee
Staff
CHRISTOPHER J. JONES, Program Officer, Study Director
JAMES C. LANCASTER, Director, Board on Physics and Astronomy
K. JOHN HOLMES, Director, Board on Energy and Environmental Systems
CHARLES FERGUSON, Director, Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board
ALTON D. ROMIG, JR., Executive Officer, National Academy of Engineering
NEERAJ P. GORKHALY, Associate Program Officer
CATHERINE WISE, Associate Program Officer
AMISHA JINANDRA, Research Associate
MEG KNEMEYER, Financial Officer
RADAKA LIGHTFOOT, Senior Financial Assistant
LINDA WALKER, Program Coordinator

1

Member, National Academy of Engineering.

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

BOARD ON PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMYABRAHAM LOEB, Harvard University, Chair
ANDREW LANKFORD, University of California at Irvine, Vice ChairWILLIAM BIALEK, NAS, 1 Princeton University
JILL DAHLBURG, Naval Research Laboratory
LOUIS DIMAURO, Ohio State University
FRANCIS DESALVO, Cornell University
WENDY FREEDMAN, NAS, University of Chicago
TIM HECKMAN, NAS, Johns Hopkins University
WENDELL HILL III, University of Maryland
ALAN HURD, Los Alamos National Laboratory
NERGIS MAVALVALA, NAS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
LYMAN PAGE, JR., NAS, Princeton University
STEVEN RITZ, University of California, Santa Cruz
SUNIL SINHA, University of California, San Diego
WILLIAM A. ZAJC, Columbia University
Staff
JAMES C. LANCASTER, Director
GREGORY MACK, Senior Program Officer
CHRISTOPHER J. JONES, Program Officer
NEERAJ P. GORKHALY, Associate Program Officer
AMISHA JINANDRA, Research Associate
MEG KNEMEYER, Financial Officer
RADAKA LIGHTFOOT, Senior Financial Assistant
LINDA WALKER, Program Coordinator

1

Member, National Academy of Sciences.

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

BOARD ON ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL SYSTEMSJARED COHON, NAE, 1 Carnegie Mellon University, Chair
VICKY BAILEY, Anderson Stratton Enterprises, LLC
CARLA BAILO, Center for Automotive Research
W. TERRY BOSTON, NAE, GridLiance GP, LLC, and Grid Protection
DEEPAK RAJ DIVAN, NAE, Georgia Institute of Technology
MARCIUS EXTAVOUR, XPRIZE
TJ GLAUTHIER, TJ Glauthier Associates, LLC
NAT GOLDHABER, Claremont Creek Ventures
BARBARA KATES-GARNICK, Tufts University
KELLY SIMS GALLAGHER, Tufts University
DENISE GRAY, LG Chem Michigan, Inc.
JOHN KASSAKIAN, NAE, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
DOROTHY ROBYN, Boston University
JOSÉ SANTIESTEBAN, NAE, ExxonMobil Research and Engineering Company
ALEXANDER SLOCUM, NAE, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
JOHN WALL, NAE, Cummins, Inc. (retired)
ROBERT WEISENMILLER, California Energy Commission (retired)
Staff
K. JOHN HOLMES, Director/Scholar
JAMES ZUCCHETTO, Senior Scientist
ELIZABETH ZEITLER, Senior Program Officer
BRENT HEARD, Associate Program Officer
KASIA KORNECKI, Associate Program Officer
CATHERINE WISE, Associate Program Officer
MICHAELA KERXHALLI-KLEINFIELD, Research Associate
REBECCA DEBOER, Research Assistant
HEATHER LOZOWSKI, Financial Manager

1

Member, National Academy of Engineering.

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NUCLEAR AND RADIATION STUDIES BOARDGEORGE APOSTOLAKIS, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (emeritus), Chair
JAMES A. BRINK, Massachusetts General Hospital, Vice ChairSALLY A. AMUNDSON, Columbia University
STEVEN BECKER, Old Dominion University
AMY J. BERRINGTON DE GONZÁLEZ, National Cancer Institute
SHAHEEN A. DEWJI, Texas A&M University
PAUL T. DICKMAN, Argonne National Laboratory
BONNIE D. JENKINS, Women of Color Advancing Peace and Security
STEPAN N. KALMYKOV, Moscow State University
ALLISON M. MACFARLANE, University of British Columbia
R. JULIAN PRESTON, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
MONICA C. REGALBUTO, Idaho National Laboratory
HENRY D. ROYAL, Washington University School of Medicine
WILLIAM H. TOBEY, Harvard John F. Kennedy School of Government
Staff
CHARLES FERGUSON, Board Director
MELISSA FRANKS, Senior Program Assistant
DARLENE GROS, Senior Program AssistantJENNY HEIMBERG, Senior Program Officer
OURANIA KOSTI, Senior Program Officer
LAURA LLANOS, Financial Business Partner

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Acknowledgment of Reviewers
This Consensus Study Report was reviewed in draft form by individuals chosen for their diverse
perspectives and technical expertise. The purpose of this independent review is to provide candid andcritical comments that will assist the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine in
making each published report as sound as possible and to ensure that it meets the institutional standards
for quality, objectivity, evidence, and responsiveness to the study charge. The review comments and draft
manuscript remain confidential to protect the integrity of the deliberative process.
We thank the following individuals for their review of this report:
Bradley (Brad) J. Adams, Southern Nuclear Operating Company,
Anjan Bose, NAE, 1 Washington State University,
Sandra Brereton, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory,
Ian Chapman, UK Atomic Energy Authority,
Andrew Holland, Fusion Industry Association,
Paul W. Humrickhouse, Idaho National Laboratory,
Richard J. Kurtz, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory,
Alan J. Lindenmoyer, Lindenmoyer Aerospace Services, LLC,
William (Bill) Shingler, Fluor Government Group,
Anne E. Smith, NERA Economic Consulting, andTina M. Taylor, Electric Power Research Institute.
Although the reviewers listed above provided many constructive comments and suggestions, they
were not asked to endorse the conclusions or recommendations of this report nor did they see the final
draft before its release. The review of this report was overseen by C. Paul Robinson, NAE, Sandia
National Laboratories (retired), and Steven J. Zinkle, NAE, University of Tennessee, Knoxville. They
were responsible for making certain that an independent examination of this report was carried out inaccordance with the standards of the National Academies and that all review comments were carefully
considered. Responsibility for the final content rests entirely with the authoring committee and the
National Academies.

1

Member, National Academy of Engineering.

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Preface
The combination of scientific progress in fusion and the changing electrical landscape in the
United States has motivated this study to examine the key goals and innovations needed to build a fusion
pilot plant. The 2019 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report of theCommittee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research described the progress in fusion anddeveloped a strategic plan to guide implementation of its two main recommendations:••First, the United States should remain an ITER partner as the most cost-effective way to gain
experience with a burning plasma at the scale of a power plant.
Second, the United States should start a national program of accompanying research andtechnology leading to the construction of a compact pilot plant that produces electricity fromfusion at the lowest possible capital cost.1

The second recommendation motivated, in part, this study. The other motivation is associated by
the changes in the electrical industry due to the on-going transition to low-carbon and non-carbon
emission technologies that has resulted in increased fusion funding from private investors. A consensus isbuilding across the country that the nation needs to establish a low-carbon emission energy mix by 2050,
and utilities are using an inclusive strategy to achieve this goal. A pilot plant is a major step on thepathway to commercialization. While it is not necessary for a fusion pilot plant to demonstrate all aspectsof a first-of-a-kind commercial power plant, it must enable an understanding of material issues, including
estimated replacement frequency and waste disposal, safety considerations, environmental considerations,etc., prior to construction of a commercial first-of-a-kind facility. Furthermore, the combination ofexperience with constructing the pilot plant and operating it should provide the developers of fusion
power plants and the owner/operators with the information needed to assess the economic attractivenessand the role of fusion in the marketplace. Thus, the pilot plant needs to address the scientific andtechnological issues to produce electricity and to identify a pathway to an attractive energy source.
The Department of Energy (DOE) requested that the National Academies address the following:••

In developing and carrying out a plan for building a Pilot Plant, key goals need to beestablished for all critical aspects of the Pilot Plant. Identify those key goals, independent ofconfinement concept, which a Pilot Plant must demonstrate during each of its anticipatedphases of operation.
List the principal innovations needed for the private sector to address, perhaps in concert withefforts by DOE, to meet the key goals identified in the first bullet.

In response to this request, the Committee on the Key Goals and Innovation Needed for a U.S.
Fusion Pilot Plant was established. The committee’s statement of task is given in Appendix A. The
committee was asked to consider the phases of operation in considering the key goals and was encouraged“to seek input from potential ‘future owners’ of power plants, such as electric utility companies, andpotential manufacturers of fusion power plant components.”
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2019, Final Report of the Committee on aStrategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research, The National Academies Press, Washington, DC, doi:
https://doi.org/10.17226/25331, p. 1.
1

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In support of the Statement of Task, the time duration for committee deliberations wascompressed to about 3 months from the first organizational meeting to issuing a draft report for review.
This committee conducted all of its meetings virtually due to the pandemic. The fusion community wasable to participate as observers in the open meetings when external speakers and panelists met with thecommittee. This report represents the consensus of the committee after four open meetings (see Appendix
B for the meeting agendas) and weekly or more frequent meetings. The first two open meetings included
representatives from DOE, including Chris Fall, Scott Hsu, John Mandrekas, Gene Nardella, and JamesW. Van Dam, and with congressional aides including Adam Rosenberg and Hillary O’Brian, whoprovided insight into the context of the study. Also, Michael Mauel, the co-chair of the Committee on aStrategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research described the 2019 report. Two days of panel
discussions were held with leaders and subject-matter experts in the following areas: licensing, including
Marc Nichol, Bill Reckley, and Gary Becker; power plant owners and operator interest, including Brad
Adams, Dave Christian, Ralph Izzo, and Tina Taylor; developers of fusion power plants, including Michl
Binderbauer, Mike Delage, Andrew Holland, David Kingham, Bob Mumgaard, and Brian Nelson;
universities, including Jean Paul Allain, Saskia Mordijck, John Sarff, and George Tynan; component
manufacturers, including Muhammad Fahmy, Alexander Molodyk, Bill Shingler, and Tony Taylor; andnational laboratories, including Dave Babineau, Steven C. Cowley, Corey McDaniel, and Mickey R.
Wade. We are very grateful for everyone who took time away from their busy schedules to present to thecommittee and answer our questions. The discussions were very interesting and valuable to thecommittee.
During the committee’s study, we received encouragement and support from many individuals
to whom we are indebted; these include James W. Van Dam of DOE’s Office of Fusion Energy Sciences,
Scott Hsu of ARPA-E, Jill Dahlberg as a member of the Board on Physics and Astronomy (BPA), andJames Lancaster, director of the BPA.
On a more personal note, I would like to express my sincere appreciation to all members of thecommittee for their dedicated efforts in preparing this report under a tight timeline despite other major
responsibilities. I would also like to express our appreciation to the staff of the National Academies,
particularly to Christopher Jones, for his advice and support through all phases of this project and making
the impossible happen.
Richard J. Hawryluk, Chair
Committee on the Key Goals and Innovation
Needed for a U.S. Fusion Pilot Plant

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Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

ES-1

1

INTRODUCTION
Committee Approach, 1-2
Structure of the Report, 1-3
Notes, 1-4

1-1

2

ROLE OF THE PILOT PLANT ON THE PATH TO COMMERCIALIZATIONElectrical Landscape, 2-2
Utility Considerations, 2-5
Electric Grid Considerations, 2-7
Marketplace Considerations, 2-8
Fusion Attributes to Address Marketplace Requirements, 2-9Notes, 2-10

2-1

3

GOALS FOR A FUSION PILOT PLANT
Integrated Fusion and Electric Power Performance, 3-1
Materials and Manufactured Components, 3-3
Fuel and Ash, 3-4
Reliability and Availability, 3-11
Environmental and Safety Considerations, 3-12
Regulatory Process, 3-12
Economic Considerations, 3-16
Notes, 3-21

3-1

4

INNOVATIONS AND RESEARCH NEEDED TO ADDRESS KEY FUSIONPILOT PLANT GOALS
Scientific and Technical Innovations and Research Advances, 4-2
Participants in Developing a Pilot Plant, 4-12
Models for Public-Private Partnerships, 4-14
ITER Contributions to a Pilot Plant, 4-16
International Collaborations, 4-18
Notes, 4-18

4-1

5

STRATEGY AND ROADMAP FOR A PILOT PLANT
Prior to Start of Construction: Conceptual and Preliminary Design (2021-2028), 5-2
Prior to Start of Operation of a Pilot Plant: Final Design and Construction (2028-2032), 5-4Start of Operation (2032-2035), 5-4
First Phase of Pilot Plant Operation (Completed by 2035-2040), 5-6
Second Phase of Pilot Plant Operation (Completed by 2040-2045), 5-6
Third Phase of Pilot Plant Operation, 5-6
Strategic Risks and Opportunities, 5-7
Summary, 5-8

5-1

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Notes, 5-8
APPENDIXESA Statement of Task
B Biographies of Committee Members
C Committee Meeting Agendas

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A-1
B-1
C-1

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Executive Summary
Fusion energy offers the prospect of addressing the nation’s energy needs and contributing to thetransition to a low-carbon emission electrical generation infrastructure. With the major fusion burning
plasma experiment known as ITER scheduled to begin operations within the next decade, many partnercountries are already undertaking large efforts to capitalize on their involvement in the international ITER
experiment and position fusion as a future energy source. Technology and research results from U.S.
investments in ITER, coupled with a strong foundation of research funded by the Department of Energy(DOE), position the United States to begin planning for its first fusion pilot plant. Strong interest from theprivate sector is an additional motivating factor, as the process of decarbonizing and modernizing thenation’s electric infrastructure accelerates and companies seek to lead the way.
Published in 2019, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report Final
Report of the Committee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research (hereafter the “Burning
Plasma report”) identified research priorities for magnetically confined plasma research in the UnitedStates. In order to reach its conclusions and recommendations, the study gathered input from academia,
government, and industry through numerous white papers, town halls, and site visits. The report
recommended that the United States remain committed to its investment in ITER, and that
The United States should start a national program of accompanying research and technology
leading to the construction of a compact pilot plant that produces electricity from fusion at thelowest possible capital cost.

In a request from DOE, the National Academies’ Committee on the Key Goals and Innovation
Needed for a U.S. Fusion Pilot Plant was asked to build upon the work of the Burning Plasma report byidentifying the key goals and innovations—independent of confinement concept—that are needed tosupport the development of a U.S. fusion pilot plant during each of its phases of operation. The
committee obtained valuable input from a broad range of stakeholders, including DOE agency staff,
congressional aides, regulators, power plant owners, developers of fusion power plants, manufacturers ofcomponents, national laboratory leaders, and university researchers and professors, to address thestatement of task. Relative to the Burning Plasma report, this committee took a somewhat different
approach to examine pathways to a pilot plant by reviewing the implications of the changing electricallandscape on how fusion can contribute to the national energy needs and taking into account that private
industry is looking at a broad range of fusion concepts. The committee did not evaluate specific fusion
concepts.
The U.S. fusion community has been a pioneer in fusion research since its inception and now has
the opportunity to bring fusion to the marketplace. On one hand, the U.S. community has not yet fully
removed the risks associated with overcoming the economic, funding, technology, and safety concerns
remaining before utilizing fusion as an energy source, and future difficulties may yet remain. On the other
hand, the United States currently faces strong competition from other groups around the world, and if thenation can overcome these risks and provide the resources for a fusion pilot plant as outlined in thisreport, it has the opportunity to play a global leadership role.
Discussions with utility owners identified that utilities are planning on making major changes tothe mix of electrical generation infrastructure to reduce carbon emission by 2050. The foreseen increased
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridinvestment in modernizing their electrical production fleet provides an opportunity for fusion tocontribute. This led to the committee’s first recommendation.
Recommendation: For the United States to be a leader in fusion and to make an impact on
the transition to a low-carbon emission electrical system by 2050, the Department of Energy
and the private sector should produce net electricity in a fusion pilot plant in the UnitedStates in the 2035-2040 timeframe. (Chapter 2)
The committee identified key goals and innovations for a pilot plant based on the input fromstakeholders received during the study as well as input received during the Burning Plasma study and therecent APS-DPP Community Planning Process. The key goals, if successfully met, would provide thescientific, technological, and economic information that would enable fusion power plant developers andutilities to move forward with a commercial fusion power plant. A great deal of scientific andtechnological progress has been made, but significant remaining technical and scientific issues must be
addressed in parallel with developing a successful pilot plant design that would enable an economicallyattractive power plant. There is increased risk associated with this approach, as compared to solving
technical and scientific issues prior to designing a pilot plant, but urgency in clean energy needs, coupledwith the promise of fusion energy, motivates this approach.
Due to the highly integrated nature of a pilot plant—including cutting-edge research, technology,
and engineering—a conceptual design leading to an engineering design is required. The teams responsible
for the design require a breadth of talent found in industry, national laboratories, and universities. An
engineering design is the basis for determining costs and developing a schedule, which is critical for
project planning and execution and will provide a focus for the work. The creation of national teams isimperative to begin the design work and to identify critical technology requirements. This led to thecommittee’s second recommendation.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should move forward now to foster thecreation of national teams, including public-private partnerships, that will develop
conceptual pilot plant designs and technology roadmaps and lead to an engineering designof a pilot plant that will bring fusion to commercial viability. (Chapter 5)
In this report, the innovations needed for a pilot plant are broadly described. While some of thetechnology innovations are applicable to multiple fusion concepts, some concept-specific innovations
need to be further defined. This report presents a strategic plan to help meet the key goals and generate
the required scientific and technological innovations to produce electricity in the 2035-2040 timeframe.
This plan identifies both goals for the various phases of design, construction, and operation of a pilot
plant and broad criteria for moving forward to the next phase. This plan is more aggressive, thus higher
risk, than that in the Burning Plasma report, since it is motivated by the needs of the electricalmarketplace to make significant investments in low-carbon and non-carbon emission electricity. This
results in the following conclusion:
Conclusion: Successful operation of a pilot plant in the 2035-2040 timeframe requires urgent
investments by DOE and private industry—both to resolve the remaining technical and scientificissues and to design, construct, and commission a pilot plant. (Chapter 5)

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1
Introduction
The 2019 National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine report of the Committee
on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research, Final Report of the Committee on a Strategic Planfor U.S. Burning Plasma Research 1 (hereafter the “Burning Plasma report”), presented guidance on a
strategic plan for a U.S. research program of burning plasma science and technology directed towardrealizing economical fusion energy. While it recognized and described significant scientific andengineering challenges, that report concluded that the knowledge developed through decades of fusion
research is now sufficiently advanced to propose a path to demonstrate fusion-generated electricity within
the upcoming decades. It described a strategic plan for fusion research to guide the implementation of its
two main recommendations:••First, the United States should remain an ITER partner as the most cost-effective way to gain
experience with a burning plasma at the scale of a power plant.
Second, the United States should start a national program of accompanying research andtechnology leading to the construction of a compact pilot plant that produces electricity fromfusion at the lowest possible capital cost. (p. 1)

The Burning Plasma report was a major input to the development of a long-range strategic planfor the Department of Energy (DOE) Fusion Energy Sciences (FES) Program. The Fusion Energy
Sciences Advisory Committee (FESAC) was charged to undertake a new long-range strategic planning
activity in November 2018. The “strategic planning activity—to encompass the entire FES research
portfolio (namely, burning plasma science and discovery science)—should identify and prioritize theresearch required to advance both the scientific foundation needed to develop a fusion energy source, as
well as the broader FES mission to steward plasma science.” 2 A two-phase process, similar to that usedby both the High Energy Physics program and the Nuclear Physics program within the Office of Science,
was conducted. In the first phase, a very broad community planning process was conducted by the APSDPP, which was completed in March 2020. 3 This planning process encompassed a much broader range ofplasma physics and fusion topics than considered by the Burning Plasma committee. An underlying andrecurrent theme of the section on fusion science and technology, which addressed the burning plasma
science topics, was how the research would impact the development of a pilot plant. In the section
regarding fusion science and technology, the community stated that its mission is to “establish the basis
for the commercialization of fusion energy in the United States by developing the innovative science andtechnology needed to accelerate the construction of a fusion pilot plant at low capital cost.” A FESAC
panel headed by Troy Carter is completing the second phase of the planning process and will issue theirrecommendations on the priorities for an optimized FES program over the next 10 years (FY 2022-2031)
under different budget scenarios. The FESAC report was not available to this committee prior to
submitting its report for review.
In parallel with the FESAC long-range strategic planning process focused on the next decade,DOE asked the National Academies to assemble a committee to provide guidance to DOE and others thatis aligned with the objectives of constructing a pilot plant in the United States that produces electricity
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridfrom fusion at the lowest possible capital cost. In this report, the Committee on the Key Goals andInnovation Needed for a U.S. Fusion Pilot Plant is to address the following:••

In developing and carrying out a plan for building a Pilot Plant, key goals need to beestablished for all critical aspects of the Pilot Plant. Identify those key goals, independent ofconfinement concept, which a Pilot Plant must demonstrate during each of its anticipatedphases of operation.
List the principal innovations needed for the private sector to address, perhaps in concert withefforts by DOE, to meet the key goals identified in the first bullet.

In doing this task, the committee was encouraged “to seek input from potential ‘future owners’ ofpower plants, such as electric utility companies and potential manufacturers of fusion power plantcomponents, to broadly characterize the energy market for fusion and to provide input on what theywould look for in a fusion pilot plant and how such plants can contribute to national energy needs.” The
full statement of task is given in Appendix A.
A fusion pilot plant producing net electricity should lead to a commercially viable fusion power
plant by providing the information needed by utilities to design, build, license and operate future plants. A
pilot plant is not meant to demonstrate the economic viability of the commercial plant but is meant to test
the technologies employed and demonstrate high-grade heat extraction to produce electricity, availability
for an extended period, and fuel cycle and tritium self-sufficiency; explore techniques to reduce
construction and operations cost; demonstrate safe and reliable operations; and provide training topotential operators of future commercial plants. A pilot plant is not expected to operate for the fulllifecycle of a first-of-a-kind power plant and thus there will be residual risks that will have to beconsidered. Nonetheless, the pilot plant will provide the basis for design and cost projections of acommercial power plant, which will enable the marketplace to establish the role of fusion in meeting theenergy needs of the nation.
While this charge closely relates to and builds on the work by the Burning Plasma committee andthe APS-DPP community planning process, there are significant differences in scope and emphasis. The
following introduction provides a summary of the committee’s approach to its task and an outline andguide to the overall structure of this final report, including the committee’s findings andrecommendations.
COMMITTEE APPROACH
This study was limited to 8 months, which is much shorter than the Burning Plasma study. In
practice, 3 months elapsed from the first meeting of the committee to the submission of the draft forreview. The duration of the study had several implications. In developing a plan for building a pilot plant,
the committee relied primarily on past studies with limited but very valuable input from experts. Previous
technical studies, as well as the results from the Burning Plasma report and the APS-DPP community
planning report, provided significant contributions. What differentiated this study—overseen by the
Board on Physics and Astronomy but in collaboration with additional boards with broader scope—wasthe emphasis on soliciting input from utilities, developers of fusion systems, and manufacturers ofcomponents for fusion systems as well as other community groups with a role in the development of apilot plant. There was a previous report by members of the U.S. fusion community and utility members 4that was written more than 20 years ago. Since then, significant changes in the electricity generation
marketplace have occurred. Thus, it was necessary to review and update as appropriate the conclusions
from the previous studies and take into account more recent work, including related work in fission.
The status and potential evolution of the electricity generation marketplace have many
ramifications that need to be considered to properly plan, build, and operate a fusion pilot plant, ranging
from new ways that fusion can contribute to including cost targets. Prior studies and inputs to the
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committee were important in understanding this evolving landscape and the uncertainty in forecasting thefuture. The emphasis on cost is an important consideration, both in the development of a pilot plant as
noted by the Burning Plasma report and in the statement of task, but also in the eventual impact onnational energy needs.
Another significant change from 20 years ago is the role of private industry seeking to develop
fusion energy and companies interested in building components for fusion. These companies have thepotential to play a major role in the development of fusion energy. Thus, understanding their potential
role was an important input. In addition, the role of electric utilities has changed in the last 20 years withsome still vertically integrated but many having their generation assets moved to another entity due tounbundling as the industry deregulated. This has impacted who can and will be able to participate in apilot plant or the first-of-a-kind commercial plant.
The Burning Plasma report and the APS-DPP community planning process identified many
scientific and technical issues that need to be addressed to both enable the construction of a fusion pilot
plant and to reduce its cost. This committee has relied heavily on those reports for the technicalinnovations required to develop a pilot plant. Although this recent, extensive body of work was very
valuable, it did not cover all of the possible fusion concepts. Burning Plasma focused on magnetic fusionenergy but did not address magneto-inertial concepts or inertial fusion energy (IFE). A 2013 report on theprospects for IFE also provided input. 5 The scope of the present report will be discussed further below.
The development of a low-cost fusion pilot plant will require not only scientific and technicalinnovation but also innovation in public policy areas to facilitate the licensing of a fusion pilot plant andthe structuring of public-private partnerships to pursue this goal. Other parallel activities are underwaythat bear on these issues. On October 6, 2020, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission held a public meeting
regarding licensing, 6 and the Fusion Industries Association has written a report on this topic. 7 The public
meeting and report provided background information to the committee. Also, in April 2020, DOE
announced a request for information to explore cost share partnership programs where the funding isprovided directly to the private-sector companies under a performance-based-milestone-driven approach. 8
The committee received the responses to this announcement, which provided background information.
The implication of adhering to the short timeline in the statement of task has required thecommittee to limit the scope of the report. The key goals for a pilot plant are broadly applicable acrossmost fusion concepts, although strongly informed by the leading fusion concept, a deuterium-tritium
fueled tokamak. Some of the goals would change with a different fuel such as hydrogen and boron. While
principal changes will be noted due to the choice of fuel, this report more extensively considers
deuterium-tritium fuel as the baseline. The range of fusion concepts spans a broad range from magnetic
confinement to magneto-inertial to inertial confinement fusion. Some scientific and technical innovations
required to construct a fusion pilot plant are largely concept independent; however, other needed
innovations depend on the concept and the level of maturity of the technical and scientific basis. In
considering how to allocate limited time on this topic, the proximity in terms of fusion parameter
performance and pulse duration relative to that needed for a commercial power plant guided the choice toemphasize the tokamak concept for this report to illustrate the types of innovations needed.
Alternatives to the tokamak concept are being developed by both the private and public sector.
The proponents of these have identified the potential for breakthrough results that would lead to a more
economical fusion reactor. Future research and discoveries may conclude that other concepts are indeed
preferrable, but the committee could not evaluate the different concepts or assess the implications of what
innovations are needed for their success within the limited timeline. This is broadly consistent with thestatement of work that the report should be independent of concept.
STRUCTURE OF THE REPORTThe following five chapters describe the committee’s guidance for a plan leading to theconstruction of a fusion pilot plant:
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•

•

•

•

Chapter 2 describes the role of the pilot plant in the pathway to commercialization. As part ofcommercialization, there will be a first-of-a-kind power plant, which will operate after the pilot
plant and needs to both be technically successful and address the needs of the marketplace.
Building a pilot plant at the lowest possible cost requires understanding what issues need to beresolved in support of utility owners’ decision making. Understanding the utility owners’
perspective was an important input in defining the key goals of a pilot plant.
Chapter 3 describes the goals of a fusion pilot plant. A distinguishing feature of a pilot plant isthat it is an integrated solution to generate net electricity that needs to be accomplished in thecontext of the pathway to commercialization, as discussed in Chapter 2. Thus, many key goals
extend beyond integrated performance, including areas such as materials, fuel supply, reliability
and availability, environmental and safety, licensing, and economic considerations. The economic
considerations include not only the cost of the pilot plant but also the pathway for an energy
source that meets the nation’s needs.
Chapter 4 describes the critical innovations needed to address the key goals. The innovations willaddress a broad range of scientific and technical issues. This chapter also discusses the roles ofthe public and private sectors and models for public-private partnership to accelerate thedevelopment of fusion.
Chapter 5 describes a strategy and roadmap for a pilot plant to address the goals in Chapter 3 andoutlines an integrated plan for building a pilot plant.
NOTES

1. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2019. Final Report of theCommittee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research. Washington, DC: The National
Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25331.
2. Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee, charge letter, https://science.osti.gov//media/fes/fesac/pdf/2018/FESAC_Charge_Letter_on_Strategic_Planning.pdf?la=en&hash=839F700086
05FAE3D1BEAE5B6AE8973292FFA5DC.
3. “A Community Plan for Fusion Energy and Discovery Science,”https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w0TKL_Jn0tKUBgUc8RC1s5fIOViH5pRK/view.
4. J. Kaslow, M. Brown, R. Hirsch, R. Izzo, J. McCann, D. McCloud, B. Muston, A. Peterson,
Jr., S. Rosen, T. Schneider, P. Skrgic, H and B. Snow. 1994. Criteria for Practical Fusion Power Systems:
Report from the EPRI Fusion Panel. Journal of Fusion Energy 13(2-3).
5. National Research Council. 2013. An Assessment of the Prospects for Inertial Fusion Energy.
Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/18289.
6. Fusion Industry Association, 2020. “DOE/NRC/FIA Public Forum on a Regulatory
Framework for Fusion,” press release, updated October 2,
https://www.fusionindustryassociation.org/post/doe-nrc-fia-public-forum-on-a-regulatory-framework-forfusion.
7. Fusion Industries Association. Igniting the Fusion Revolution in America.
https://www.fusionindustryassociation.org/post/fusion-regulatory-white-paper.
8. “Cost-Sharing Partnerships With the Private Sector in Fusion Energy”
https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/04/20/2020-08312/cost-sharing-partnerships-with-theprivate-sector-in-fusion-energy.

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2
Role of the Pilot Plant on the Path to Commercialization
As indicated in Figure 2.1, a consensus is building across the country that the nation needs toestablish a low-carbon emission energy mix by 2050, and utilities are planning to use an inclusive
strategy to achieve this goal. No form of low-carbon emission energy is being ruled out at this point. As aresult, the investment in low-carbon and non-carbon emission energy technologies has skyrocketed, andadvances in carbon capture, energy storage, nuclear fission, and renewables are being made at a rapid
pace. If fusion is to play a role in the energy mix, it will need to distinguish itself in an extremelycompetitive market. As such, a fusion pilot plant will need to demonstrate characteristics that can beextrapolated with low uncertainty to a first-of-a-kind (FOAK) plant that will be competitive in the energy
market. Predicting the state of the energy market is complex as it depends on state and federal policies,
which are influenced by many factors, such as the political landscape and the economy. Frequent
communication with the potential users of the technology, the utilities themselves, may help inform theseprojections as market conditions change. Utility integrated resource plans can be used to estimate thecharacteristics that must be met by a FOAK plant. The committee received briefings and input from threeelectrical utility executives, which were valuable in understanding their planning for this transition.

FIGURE 2.1 Illustration of the pledges from major utilities in the United States to reduce annual carbon
emissions by 2050. SOURCE: Data from Nuclear Energy Institute, ABB Velocity Suite, U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency, and public press releases. ©2020 Nuclear Energy Institute.
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

ELECTRICAL LANDSCAPE
The current and future energy market would suggest that the United States will remain energy
independent and this will continue unless disruptive events in policy or the geopolitical landscape occur.
Changes in the generation mix are expected to continue over the next 30 years, suggesting that there will
be large capital investments in both generation resources and in transmission and storage assets toaccommodate the shift to low-carbon emission resources. Facilitating the low-carbon transformation andproviding dispatchable power with blackstart capability competitively frames likely market opportunities
for fusion generation in the foreseeable decades, if it can be developed and competitively available by thetime those investments need to be made. This presents a window for major investment that can be
captured by fusion if it can be successfully demonstrated including showing economic attractiveness. This
could be a challenge to the future of a commercial fusion power plant unless a pilot fusion plant withunique attributes can be successfully built prior to 2050, encouraging the development of this technology.
According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook 2020 withprojections to 2050, 1 electricity use will continue to grow due to increased electrification in all sectors;
however, growth will likely occur at a slower rate than in the past due to increased efficiency (Figure 2.2).

FIGURE 2.2 Projections by the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s Annual Energy Outlook
2020 showing the growth in electricity use. “Direct use” is use of electricity that is self-generated,
produced by either the same entity that consumes the power or an affiliate, and is used in direct support
of a service or industrial process located within the same facility or group of facilities that house thegenerating equipment. SOURCE: U.S. Energy Information Administration, Annual Energy Outlook
2020, https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/AEO2020%20Electricity.pdf.
At least 30 GW of additional generation resources are expected to be needed annually from 2040
to 2050 based on the reference case analysis for the United States. This is consistent with others’ view on
the exploding demand for non-CO2 producing sources of electricity globally, 2 as shown in Figure 2.3. In
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridthe future, sources of electricity generation that can be dispatched on demand at the request of power grid
operators, known as firm dispatchable generation, will be needed. By 2050, this firm dispatchable future
generation will be a competition between several forms of generation—fission, natural gas with carbon
capture, renewables paired with storage and hydrogen or natural gas generation, and fusion. All will needto make sure that the electric transmission upgrades will not be prohibitively expensive for the location
selected. Generation with a flexibility of siting, like fusion, will have an advantage in certain geographic
areas and can enable microgrid development. 3 Microgrids will be a part of the new electricity grid andalong with other sources such as renewable generation will reduce the number but not the need forbaseload, firm low-carbon and non-carbon emission generation facilities to deal with the variability ofloads, generation sources, weather condition impacts and other factors discussed in this section.

FIGURE 2.3 Projections of world electricity capacity using the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change model. SOURCE: Mickey R. Wade, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, presentation to thecommittee, October 2020, based on AMPERE Public Database website,
https://tntcat.iiasa.ac.at/AMPEREDB/dsd.
This significant change of the electric energy landscape is underway today to shift to a lowcarbon emission generation mix in the future. If successful, this change in generation from a carbon-based
fuel to a low-carbon mix will likely occur due to state regulations, public policy requirements, customer
preferences, and stockholder desires. A fusion pilot plant followed by a FOAK power plant will beentering the electric energy market in the middle to near the end of this transformation in the UnitedStates.
Electric utilities in the future will need firm low-carbon and non-carbon emission resources intheir generation portfolio if they are going to support a low cost, lower carbon future. 4 These resources
will assist with the load variability in daily grid operations by having generation and storage resourcesthat can meet the demand in all seasons and over long durations, (>4 hours), when needed such as during
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severe weather events. The generation resources will include nuclear fission power plants capable offlexible operations, hydro plants with high-capacity reservoirs, coal and natural gas plants with carbon
capture, geothermal power, biomass and bio-gas fueled power plants, and nuclear fusion power plants.
Presently, utilities are seeing large swings in daily operations and are using their dispatchable
resources or base load generation to manage these variable conditions. The use of high-speed electronic
controlled DC to AC systems with short term storage, a type of Flexible AC Transmission (FACTs)
device, known as Statcoms, will continue to propagate on the transmission networks along withsynchronous generators to assist with stability issues and provide the required speed for voltage or voltampere reactive (var) support in geographic areas where firm low-carbon emission resources are notavailable.
As the transmission network integrates more electronic controlled loads and generation resources,
the speed of the required network response will become faster than the four seconds that the network
response has today to maintain stability. The speed of response in the future will depend on the number offirm low-carbon emission resources operating in a specific region as a percentage of the overall
generation mix.
Larger grid scale storage, such as pump storage facilities or large scale battery installations with
>4 hours of energy, will help with both short-term variability in renewable energy resources and weekly
variability requirements, but the ability to cost effectively deploy at locations needed will limit theirpenetration within the marketplace.
Unlike electronic controlled generation like photovoltaic power stations, firm low-carbon
emission resources will provide the inertia and fault current required for protective systems (relays, fuses)
to operate as designed on the transmission and distribution systems 5 and also within existing homes,commercial and industrial buildings.
The changes in dynamic resources required for voltage or var support with renewable generation
resources plus relay protection changes required will necessitate additional system modifications toaccommodate the increasing penetration of renewable resources. The number of system augmentation
devices needed, such as FACTs devices, will be offset by the regional installation of firm, low-carbon andnon-carbon emission generation resources.
In addition, the electric industry will need a diversity in baseload or firm, low-carbon and noncarbon emission energy resources to offset any disruption in future fuel supplies or technology threats forexample cyber-security or changes in policy on the nation’s energy landscape. The energy landscape has
traditionally had disruptions that have pivoted the direction of generation production. At the beginning of
power generation, the major units were either coal or hydroelectric units. This changed over time, and by
the 1950s the movement began from coal production, peaking around 1970. The 1973 oil embargo shifted
generation away from oil generation and moved production back to coal and nuclear energy production.
During this period, substantial pumped hydroelectric storage was deployed to help match these firm
resources to variable demand. In 1979, the Three Mile Island accident slowed nuclear plant builds, and it
was not until the 1990s when nuclear power had public acceptance and acceptable cost. The renaissancefor nuclear power in the early 2000s was impeded after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident andas a result of low natural gas prices in the United States. In 2010 the market shifted again to grid-scale
photovoltaics (PV) due to a continuing decline in panel price, increased efficiency, PV subsidies, andpublic demand. If history is any guide, disruption in the generation market will likely occur in the future,so as we envision future generation, we need to assume that the generation mix will change and thatdiversity is important for national security and resiliency. The United States has had one of the mostreliable electrical grids due to the diversity of fuels/sources in its generation mix allowing the industry topivot as disrupting events occurred. These events showed the need for fuel diversity in regulated utility
generation planning and the role of the natural diversity provided by the larger interconnected U.S.
electrical grid with regional fuel supply diversity. Fusion energy will help ensure that diversity continues
into the next century while providing a non-carbon emission source of energy.
Significant disruptive events have routinely occurred in this sector and will likely occur in the
future due to possible policy decisions, such as the potential elimination of fracking to extract natural gas
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridor oil supplies or possible nation-state decisions on the cost or availability of critical materials required
for renewable energy or energy storage systems. The potential disruption of any energy fuel source has
caused the nation to deploy diverse sources of energy supply so that there is resiliency in thisinfrastructure that is so critical for national security. The future risk to generation from nation statesenhances the national security need for resiliency of generation types as these threats now include
supply chain disruptions, electromagnetic threats, and cyber threats.
Recommendation: Electricity generation market policy and incentives should encourage adiversity of energy sources from various firm, low-carbon emission generation resources
including non-carbon emission fusion, in the future for baseload as part of a national
strategy to ensure national security and the lowest cost path to a low-carbon emission
future.
UTILITY CONSIDERATIONSThe U.S. electric industry has changed significantly over the last decades as transmission system
operations have been unbundled from generation assets in many areas, which has enabled competitive
developers to enter the generation marketplace. Competitive generators are not expected to be the first to
develop or operate a fusion plant. Rather, to diversify risk and share cost, a fusion plant will likely befunded by a coalition consisting of the federal government, state governments, private industry andprivate developers plus a group of Investor Owned Utilities (IOUs) with regulated generation assets.
The economic considerations for IOUs to participate in the development or operation of a pilot
plant will be driven by state support (regulatory or policy), the impact on potential economic
development, the value this technology may provide to the electric generation mix in the regions they
serve plus their financial goals. Past pilot plants that demonstrate new generation technologies have been
expensive on a cost per kW basis, typically driven by external benefits and an understanding of thepotential future benefits. A few examples of past pilot plants include the Shippingport Nuclear plant,
Duke’s Edwardsport Clean Coal plant, Australia’s Callide Oxyfuel, and Dominion Energy’s Offshore
Wind demonstration plant.
Technology for a pilot plant must be shown to be safe and provide good indication of theeconomic viability, cost certainty, regulatory certainty, reliability, and availability to future operators
through the development and operation of a small-scale pilot plant. Considerations need to include
upfront and ongoing maintenance requirements. This will provide confidence to key decision makers,
such as the boards of directors of investor owned utilities or public utility commissions that costs will not
greatly exceed estimates prior to the start of the first commercial fusion projects.
In the 2020 Annual Technology Baseline report by NREL, 6 the overnight costs for nuclear fission(moderate) are projected to decrease from $6,062/kW in 2020 to $4,916/kW in 2050, 7 and the nuclear
fission industry with support from DOE is working to reduce this cost to a level more attractive toinvestors through its Nuclear Technology Enabling Technologies program. 8 Given the importance ofminimizing operating and maintenance expenses plus associated personnel required to operate any
generation asset, the same attention to the use of robotics and advanced analytics will be importantconsiderations for a commercial fusion plant in design development. It is with this backdrop that electricutilities will be considering the cost for the first commercial fusion plant, so the benefits brought by thistechnology will need to justify any overnight cost premium. One such consideration will be the extent towhich carbon emissions are reduced, as indicated in Figure 2.4, and the need for firm low-carbon andnon-carbon emission electricity. Many researchers have reviewed the various cost consequences to reacha low-carbon emission future and have concluded that the lowest cost option is with firm, low-carbon andnon-carbon emission generation resources in our electricity mix.

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FIGURE 2.4 The cost of electricity is projected to increase as CO2 emissions decrease; however, theinclusion of firm low-carbon emission electricity production resources consistently reduces the increase.
The cost of electricity is in constant 2016 dollars. SOURCE: Reprinted from N.A. Sepulveda, J.D.
Jenkins, F.J. de Sistemes, and R.K. Lester, “The Role of Firm Low-Carbon Electricity Resources in Deep
Decarbonization of Power Generation,” Joule 2: 2403-2420, 2018, doi: 10.1016/j.joul.2018.08.006,
Copyright 2018 with permission from Elsevier.
Potential utility investors will require regulatory and cost certainty for a future fusion commercial
plant plus an understanding of any cost risks associated with construction and operating and maintenanceexpenses. This plant will need to operate through at least one environmental cycle. This includes:
installation of integrated core components, fusion plant startup and operation in which the fusion
environment degrades the component performance to the point where it must be replaced or repaired,
and that such maintenance actions are taken to allow further operation of the plant. Operation for anenvironmental cycle enables understanding the expected outage expenses and projecting the reductions
expected in outage duration, operating and security personnel required for a commercial facility.
Characteristics for a fusion power plant that must be demonstrated by the pilot plant for electric utility
acceptance through the phases of operation include: safety, minimum capital cost, data for life expectancy
of components, operating and maintenance expenses, acceptable emissions and waste streams, siting
requirements (air and water), social acceptance and other risk such as fuel, replacement part supply chain,insurance, etc. Issues for fusion power plant concepts that include tritium in the fuel mixture will be
discussed in Chapter 3 and need to be addressed. A pilot plant is not expected to operate for the fulllifecycle of a first-of-a-kind power plant and thus there will be residual risks that will have to beconsidered. Nonetheless, the pilot plant must prove that the technology is viable and forecast economics
for the commercial plant to demonstrate that the leveled cost of electricity is comparable with otheravailable generation types, which will enable the marketplace to establish the role of fusion in meeting theenergy needs of the nation.
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While it is not necessary for a fusion pilot plant to demonstrate all aspects of a FOAK
commercial power plant, it must enable an understanding of material issues including estimatedreplacement frequency or waste disposal, safety considerations, environmental considerations, etc. prior
to construction of a commercial FOAK facility. This time should allow utility operators to develop
procedures, estimate maintenance intervals, validate cost assumptions, perform material research, andunderstand longer term waste management. Given the timeline of development for the pilot and FOAK
commercial facility, the use of robotics, remote sensing, advanced analytics, computer controls, etc. will
reduce operating and maintenance costs. These advances should also provide shorter maintenanceintervals and waste stream reductions as well as reduce operations and security staffing requirements. The
pilot plant will be able to evaluate the impact of these advances.
ELECTRIC GRID CONSIDERATIONSThe siting of any form of generation is also a major component of capital expenditures, since
siting not only involves the cost of the land but also must deal with cost uncertainty (and potential project
delays) due to federal, state, and local regulatory requirements; environmental requirements such as the
National Environmental Policy Act, and any infrastructure expenditures needed to either transmit
electricity from the location or bring fuel to the generation location.
The electric industry is currently seeing significant cost uncertainty and delays with large electrictransmission line upgrades or new installations due to public and environmental sentiment against theseinfrastructure projects. 9 This is expected to continue in future years, so new generation sites will need to
be installed near existing transmission corridors or at locations of existing generation plants where thisinfrastructure is already installed.
The same cost uncertainty and potential for project time delays also are evident today for gas
transmission facilities. 10 Hydrogen or natural gas generation facilities also have to contend with this same
issue to ensure that gas transmission pipelines having enough capacity to support the fuel required for thegeneration site or there is sufficient onsite gas storage, which will significantly add to the cost of
construction.
Some of the Extra High Voltage Alternating Current (EHV-AC) electric transmission corridors
existing today could be repurposed for Extra High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) by 2050 in an effort tobring renewable energy, such as midcontinent wind generation to the eastern seaboard or other regions in
the United States. 11 This will further encumber the existing infrastructure so that some transmission
corridors may not allow for the easy siting of dispatchable firm generation due to the inability to obtainthe needed export transmission lines.
The cost to build a fusion pilot plant or a FOAK commercial plant will be reduced if placement
can be made to leverage existing infrastructure. An enhanced value proposition can be made for an FOAK
plant if it provides grid support functions since this plant will perform augmentation functions that thegrid operator will not have to install.
In addition, the future grid will need a percentage of its generation resources to be firm, lowcarbon and non-carbon emission generators to successfully manage the various conditions it must
support. Therefore, unique value is possible if a FOAK plant exhibits capabilities such as:
•
•
•
•
•
•

Dispatchability
Load following
Onsite fuel supplies for long duration events (>4 hours)
Voltage or VAR support in regions
Inertia for frequency response
Sufficient fault current for protective equipment to function

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Another requirement that will be presented over this period is the need for more blackstartcapability. 12,13 The electric utility industry must have recovery plans to ensure they can recover frommajor disturbances including high impact, low probability events such as cyberattacks or Electromagnetic
Pulse (EMP) events and extreme weather events—if the network goes completely down. A blackstart
generator is a unit that can start its own power without support from the grid in the event of a major
system collapse or a system-wide blackout. In the United States, every North American Electric
Reliability Corp. (NERC) region has its own blackstart plan and procedures. As the generation mix
changes to include more renewables, 14 it challenges the existing blackstart capability that is available in
the regions. Fusion has generic properties such as on-site fuel, baseload capability and potentiallydispatchable that are attractive to blackstart. A more detailed study of specific designs and challenges tosupport this national security need is encouraged.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy, along with industry participants, should
study blackstart requirements through 2050 and whether specific fusion power plantdesigns can support this national security need, either as a primary blackstart unit orsecondary generating unit to aid startup of one or more other generating units.
Without the grid support functions, additional cost will be shifted to individuals and businesses
for protection changes. Transmission and distribution systems will incur additional expenses for enhanced
communication requirements to operate a digital grid, increased cyber protection requirements with moredigital devices, protective relay system changes to quickly isolate this new system and additional gridaugmentation devices such as FACTS devices to manage this grid.
A grid without firm, low-carbon and non-carbon emission generation would increase exposure to
cybersecurity threats, harmonic interaction of electronic devices, less response time for reaction to
dynamic events and an increased fragility of the network to overcome extreme events resulting in a higher
cost to reach a low-carbon emission future. 15
Finding: Dispatchable, firm low-carbon and non-carbon emission generation will be needed in
the future for grid support functions and can enhance the movement to a lower carbon footprint at
a lower cost.
MARKETPLACE CONSIDERATIONSInvestor owned public utilities have an obligation to serve the public in a manner that is supportedby the public they serve. It is therefore important that investor owned utilities have public acceptance forfusion energy prior to engaging in support of a pilot fusion plant or before they can pursue financial
investment in a FOAK commercial fusion plant. This public acceptance will need to be garnered prior tothe construction of a pilot fusion plant so that they can have the necessary local and state support to enter
this activity. Given that the fusion pilot plant is demonstrating a new technology, it will need to reinforce
the confidence of the public by demonstrating safe and viable environmental operations, which includes
waste disposal. The fusion industry, along with the federal government, will need to educate the public on
this technology in advance of the first pilot plant so that acceptance can be realized.
The movement by electric utilities to zero-carbon generation by the 2050 timeframe indicates anopportunity window that this technology must seize if it is going to become viable as part of the midcentury generation fuel mix. A fusion pilot fusion plant will need to go in service in the 2035-2040
timeframe for a plant to have time to demonstrate the viability and differentiation factors of fusion
generation so commercial plants can participate in this new generation investment window.
At present, Investor Owned Utilities are not financially supporting fusion development. Investor
Owned Utility engagement with a fusion pilot plant will require that sufficient data is delivered to move
forward expeditiously (estimated at 3 to 5 years) to the construction of a FOAK commercial plant. To
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provide the necessary demonstration characteristics to the future owners of a power plant, state or federal
regulators, the pilot plant must anticipate and provide the data required for the design of a FOAK facility
while at the same time minimizing the cost.
Finding: A pilot plant must provide the technical and economic information needed for utilities
to operate future plants. It must be a test to ensure public confidence in the technology and thesuccess of the commercial plants that will follow.
To develop this capability at a minimum capital cost for a pilot plant, the net electricity output
will likely be in the 50 MW to 100 MW range depending on technology and concept used. This will allow
for testing of the interface to a transmission system while providing sufficient scale to support estimates
for a FOAK plant. This includes enough data to predict availability and how it will compare to thecontinued improvement of nuclear fission plants at that time. The goals for the pilot plant will be
discussed further in Chapter 3.
Investments in a fusion pilot plant will most likely be by a combination of government andprivate funding. Fusion research has historically been primarily funded by the Department of Energy(DOE), and DOE is expected to continue to play a predominant role in the development of fusion andhave a major role in the development of a pilot plant. Due to the potential for electricity production,industry has become significantly involved in development of fusion concepts and technologies
supporting fusion development. Funding for fusion industry developers has been rapidly growing andfusion industry developers may play a major role in the development of a pilot plant. This development
will facilitate the commercialization of fusion and the transition to a FOAK power plant.
Building the U.S. fusion industry and potential investor confidence is predicated on proving theviability of technology for a sufficiently sized market opportunity. This FOAK fusion plant will need tocompete with other firm low-carbon and non-carbon emission sources of generation, and thus theestimated cost of a future plant must be competitive to firm generation sources at that time.
State and federal government support of utility involvement in the cost to build a fusion pilot
plant will depend on many factors, such as public support of this technology, potential economic benefits
to the region or state for future manufacturing, construction or technical jobs or unique benefits that thistechnology may provide for the electric grid. Previous state and federal support for similar projects
included: federal grants, federal and state tax credits, cost sharing, federal government loan guarantees,
federal production tax credits, and state declaration on prudency of expenditures up to a capped value forrecovery of utility investment. Examples of other generation pilot plants will be discussed in Chapter 3.
FUSION ATTRIBUTES TO ADDRESS MARKETPLACE REQUIREMENTS
Fusion power generation will have an advantage in this time period if the pilot plant candemonstrate, for example, the following: load following capability, dispatchability, less long-lived
radioactive waste and comparable normal radioactive effluents to fission plants, constructability for acommercial plant, reasonable staffing requirements for operations or security, licensing expectations,public acceptance, scalability to a commercial plant, availability and reliability which would lead to costand regulatory certainty for the FOAK commercial plant.
Fusion will not be unique in providing non-carbon emission energy but will be one of a handfulof generation technologies during this period that may have significant national security benefits, such as
an onsite fuel source, energy fuel diversity, firm non-carbon emission generation, potential ability to load
follow, dispatchability, grid support functions, and a potential to aid in the blackstart13 of the electric gridfollowing a major disturbance.
There is also a foreign policy benefit for the United States to be the first country to deploy costeffective fusion power as countries such as China and Russia are enhancing their global influence throughexport of fission power reactors. Nuclear technology is sought after by numerous developing countries
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Griddue to the promise of energy security and as a means of gaining international prestige through theharnessing of a highly technical energy source.
The other benefits include providing electrical system inertia, system fault current support, noncarbon emission energy, similar balance of plant features to conventional plants, higher energy density,
flexible siting, a long term source of energy, energy fuel diversity, volt-ampere reactive (var) control andvoltage control plus the absence of high-level waste and the ability to become a heat source for otherfunctions such as hydrogen production using high temperature steam electrolysis. 16 As noted in theprevious section, there is also the potential benefit of contributing as either a primary blackstart unit orsecondary generating unit but this needs to be evaluated.
While demonstrating a pathway to a commercial power plant, a fusion pilot plant can also
demonstrate external benefits that can be considered for a FOAK commercial plant such as:
•
•
•
•
•

Foreign policy benefit for the United States to be the first country to deploy cost-effective
fusion power.
Impact on a region’s carbon reduction.
Impact on renewable portfolio requirements by the state or region.
Ability to ramp power output to react to variability of renewable generation swings.
The potential to create national or regional growth and new employment opportunities foritems such as plant operations, plant construction, manufacturing facilities, development of
manufacturing support roles and technical skills sets.

Recommendation: For the United States to be a leader in fusion and to make an impact on
the transition to a low-carbon emission electrical system by 2050, the Department of Energy
and the private sector should produce net electricity in a fusion pilot plant in the UnitedStates in the 2035-2040 timeframe.
Recommendation: Due to the evolving energy marketplace, the characteristics of a fusion
power plant should be periodically reviewed by energy experts and updated to increase thelikelihood that the fusion concept will successfully contribute to the needs of society.
NOTES
1. EIA, “Annual Energy Outlook 2020 with projection to 2050”,
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/.
2. Wade presentation to the committee on October 2020 referencing the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) model.
3. DOE defines microgrid as “a group of interconnected loads and distributed energy resources
within clearly defined electrical boundaries that acts as a single controllable entity with respect to thegrid. A microgrid can connect and disconnect from the grid to enable it to operate in both grid-connected
or islandmode.”
https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2016/06/f32/The%20US%20Department%20of%20Energy’s%20
Microgrid%20Initiative.pdf.
4. Nestor A. Sepulveda, Jesse D. Jenkins, Fernando J. de Sistemes, and Richard K. Lester, “TheRole of Firm Low-Carbon Electricity Resources in Deep Decarbonization of Power Generation”, Joule 2,2403-2420, November 21, 2018.
5. Sandia National Laboratories, November 1, 2019, “Advanced Protection for Inverter-Based
Systems”, Matthew J. Reno, https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1646214.
6. NREL, Annual Technology Baseline, 2020 ATB data,
https://atb.nrel.gov/electricity/2020/data.php.
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7. Relies on U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) representation of current year plant
cost estimates and for plant cost projections through 2050 from AEO2020 (EIA, 2020,EIA (2020).
Annual Energy Outlook 2020 with Projections to 2050. (No. AEO2020). U.S. Energy Information
Administration. https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/aeo/pdf/AEO2020.pdf ) This report notes data is based on
2019 dollars/kW.
8. https://www.energy.gov/ne/nuclear-reactor-technologies/nuclear-energy-enablingtechnologies.
9. FERC, Staff report to Congress, “Report on Barriers and Opportunities for High Voltage
Transmission, A Report to the Committees on Appropriations of Both Houses of Congress Pursuant to the2020 Further Consolidated Appropriations Act”, https://cleanenergygrid.org/wpcontent/uploads/2020/08/Report-to-Congress-on-High-Voltage-Transmission_17June2020-003.pdf.
10. Energy Now, July 8, 2020, “The Problematic Future of Gas Pipelines”,
https://energynow.com/2020/07/the-problematic-future-of-gas-pipelines/.
11. U.S. Energy Information Administration, “Assessing HVDC Transmission for impacts of
Non-Dispatchable Generation”, June, 2018,https://www.eia.gov/analysis/studies/electricity/hvdctransmission/pdf/transmission.pdf.
12. M.M. Adibi, Gerry Adamski, Ronaldo Jenkins and Paul Gill, “Nuclear Plant Requirements
During System Restoration”, IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, Vol. 10, No. 3, pp. 1486-1491, 1995.
13. DOE, ORNL/SPR-2018/1077, May, 2019, “Hydro Plants as Black Start Resources”, page vi,
https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2019/05/f62/Hydro-Black-Start_May2019.pdf.
14. NERC Reliability Guidelines, “Improvement to Interconnection Requirements for BPSConnected Inverter-Based Resources”, September, 2019, pp. 18-22.
15. Jesse D. Jenkins, Max Luke, and Samuel Thernstrom, “Getting to Zero Carbon Emissions in
the Electric Power Sector”, Joule 2, 2487-2510, December 19, 2018.
16. https://inl.gov/article/xcel-energy-inl-hydrogen-production/.

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3
Goals for a Fusion Pilot Plant
A fusion pilot plant is required to demonstrate key performance and cost metrics to directly
enable first-of-a-kind (FOAK) commercial fusion electric power plants. This creates a set ofinterconnected requirements in the scientific, technical and economic missions of a fusion pilot.
INTEGRATED FUSION AND ELECTRIC POWER PERFORMANCE
The primary goal of the pilot is to produce electricity from fusion energy. Therefore, there arebasic requirements for the fusion core and the plant’s electric performance.
The first requirement is that the concept must demonstrate reliable net energy gain from fusion
reactions. The first hurdle is net plasma gain, Qp, i.e., the ratio of fusion power to input power to theplasma, must exceed unity. It is self-evident that this objective is the minimum required for a power plant,
but it is also an important threshold in fusion science since this also represents the minimum where thefusion plasma can start to heat itself in order to sustain the temperatures necessary for fusion. No fusion
concept has yet met this criterion, although deuterium-tritium (D-T) tokamaks have achieved up to
Qp = .67. The second hurdle is net plant electrical energy gain Qe, such that the amount of time-averaged
electrical power generated by the fusion core exceeds the electrical power required for operation. This
step requires the conversion of fusion energy into electricity taking into account the total electrical powerfor plasma heating, and any other forms of power required (e.g., pumps for heat removal or refrigerators),
and therefore requires plasma gain well above one. Furthermore, this step requires the use of appropriatetechnologies to efficiently capture and convert the fusion power to electricity.
The second requirement of the pilot is that it provides cost certainty to the marketplace in termsof capital cost, construction time, control of radioactive effluents including tritium, the cost of electricity
and the maintenance/operating schedule and cost. The electrical market and fusion science guide therange of power generation in a pilot. The upper range of mature technology electrical generating units,~400-1500 MWe, should be avoided in the pilot because these will inherently not meet the minimum costrequirement. The lower limit for a pilot is set by two considerations. First, cost certainty requires aminimum power generation scale such that the extrapolation to FOAK is reliable and reasonable. The
FOAK power is not well defined, in part because its power level will be set by the pilot performance andmarketplace considerations, but a range of 100-500 MWe appears to be a reasonable entry point for adispatchable, centralized electricity source such as fusion. Secondly, the science of achieving sufficient
Qp and Qe requires a minimum fusion power because the fusion power is also the plasma’s primaryheating source. While configuration dependent, most fusion designs public 1 and private 2 inputs find thisto be in the 100-500 MWth range, which would approximately translate to a gross electric power of 40200 MWe assuming a conversion efficiency of 40%, while net electric power depends on multiple design
factors including Qp, cooling power and wall plug efficiency of plasma heating.

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Finding: The pilot plant design must be based on a vetted, well-established confinement physics
basis to achieve net plasma gain well in excess of unity.
Conclusion: A pilot plant must produce an amount of fusion power and energy that is sufficiently
representative of the market needs in order to meet the pilot’s goal of demonstrated integrated
performance and cost, while also demonstrating net electricity gain Qe > 1 and producing peak
net electrical power ≥50 MWe.
The third requirement of a pilot plant is the demonstration of sufficient fusion power duration thatthe plant is providing certainty as to the cost and viability of FOAK operation in the marketplace. The
nature of fusion technology and science leads to several distinct phases of demonstration and learning fora pilot plant towards the ultimate goal of operating the pilot in a manner closely representative of FOAK
operations. These phases are set by the characteristic timescales involved in the fusion system.
Findings: Regardless of concept, a fusion pilot plant generally needs to meet these phased
requirements:
Phase 1a: Production of net fusion plasma energy gain (Qp ≳ 1) for many characteristic
timescales of the concept. Plasma timescales can include energy and particle confinement,
pulse duration, stability, particle/ash exhaust and magnetic field distributions. Power exhausttimescales include heat transfer in plasma-facing components and coolants in continuous
concepts, or sufficient fusion energy producing events at repeated performance in pulsed
designs.
Phase 1b: Capture and conversion of this fusion energy into electricity for the characteristic
timescales for generating electricity including the blanket (in D-T systems), heat exchange,electricity generating equipment such as turbines, recirculating power, and waste heatrejection. Furthermore, this phase requires demonstrating a single closed fuel/ash cycle. For
D-T concepts, this would require recovery of tritium from the blanket for insertion into thefusion plasma, although not necessarily in real time. All concepts should demonstratesustained ash removal.
Phase 2: Production of fusion power and electricity for an environmental cycle of the componentsthat are degraded by the fusion energy production expected in a FOAK annual operation
cycles. This includes material erosion and migration of plasma-facing surfaces, fuel/ashtransport and retention, sensors, plasma actuators and material damage caused by energetic
neutrons in D-T systems.
Phase 3: Production of fusion power and electricity for many environmental cycles or for several
designs of internal components in order to fully define the lifetime and availability, andpotentially optimize manufactured components of commercial fusion power plants.
Conclusion: Phase 1a should target 100-500 MW time-averaged thermal power for ≥100 s,
which will exceed the characteristic plasma and power removal timescales. Phase 1a should
demonstrate sufficient fusion plasma energy gain (Qp) that net electricity is feasible insubsequent pilot phases. For pulsed concepts, these facilities should operate at the design
repetition rate for Phase 2.
Conclusion: Phase 1b should target ≳50 MWe peak electricity generation and time-averaged
electricity generation for ≥104 s (≥3 hours) with Qe > 1. For D-T fusion, the pilot plant should
demonstrate production, extraction and refueling of tritium on a timescale sufficient to maintainreasonable operations. For pulsed concepts, these should be for a comparable time scale of ≥3
hours at the design repetition rate for Phase 2.
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Conclusion: Phase 2 should target 100-500 MW net fusion time-averaged thermal power, and≥50 MWe peak electricity generation and Qe > 1, for a period of time that integrated fusioncomponents demonstrate an environmental cycle. This is most likely to eventually require
operation on the order of one full power year.
Conclusion: Phase 3 should target 100-500 MW net fusion time-averaged thermal power, and≥50 MWe peak electricity generation and Qe > 1, through several environmental cycles in orderto demonstrate and improve average availability for commercial fusion, provide additional dataon the mean time to failure and replacement time, for materials/components, and have the option
to use the platform for testing advanced materials and technology and novel deployment of fusion
to the grid.
MATERIALS AND MANUFACTURED COMPONENTS
It is evident from input received from electrical utilities that in order for the fusion pilot plant toprovide the foundation necessary to enable a FOAK fusion power plant, that the pilot plant in Phase 2
operation will need to produce continuous energy, or perhaps with a representative availability of at least
50%, for at least one, if not two, environmental cycle(s). An environmental cycle is characterized as aperiod that includes: installation of integrated core components, fusion plant operation in which the fusion
environment degrades the component performance to the point where it must be replaced or repaired, andthat such maintenance actions are taken to allow further operation of the plant. While an environmental
cycle is not strictly defined numerically, because it can vary across design approaches, based on ourpresent knowledge base it likely represents a significant (order one full power year) operational time
before maintenance/repair would be required in a FOAK. It is important to note that this range of times
would be familiar to and expected for operators of FOAKs in the marketplace. This environmental cycle
requirement imposes clear goals for the performance of key components: Plasma Facing Components(PFC) or armor, internal structural and blanket materials, power extraction systems, and breeding
materials (if required) to successfully demonstrate operation up to a global neutron or ion surface/wallloading equivalent to approximately 1 to 3 MW-year m-2 on the PFC armor, and approximately 2 to 3
MW-year m-2 on the internal structural and blanket materials, in order to experience the coupledenvironmental degradations arising from combinations of plasma particles, thermal loading, ionizing
radiation and high-energy neutrons. While this combination may vary across approaches, all pilot designs
must account for this degradation. Table 3.1 provides goals for the PFCs and structural materials in Phase
2. Phase 2 will also need to demonstrate effective remote maintenance and component replacement inorder to provide greater certainty for the maintenance time and operation and maintenance costs of the
FOAK fusion plant. The combination of neutron flux, remote maintenance strategy, material properties
and facility availability will determine the duration of Phase 2 to test material degradation discussed inTable 3.1 and can vary depending on fusion concept.
The Phase 1 operation will focus on power generation for a relatively short duration in which thechallenges associated with the power rate (global power, particle flux rate) are overcome but without thedegradation that will occur after days of operation. Phase 1 itself is expected to have two operating
sequences. The large engineering components such as magnets, vacuum vessel, plasma heating andcooling, will need to be commissioned in a pilot. Phase 1a (Table 3.1) would focus on establishing theequilibrated fusion power performance and immediate thermal response of the PFC actively cooled
components, which is their first integrated test at representative thermal conditions. The duration ofplasma operation and heat exhaust would be increased within Phase 1b in order to demonstrate the ability
to reach a steady rate of fusion power, capture the fusion energy and demonstrate the capability togenerate electricity. From a material and components viewpoint Phase 1 demonstrates solutions to the socalled “zero dpa” integration challenges, i.e., issues centered around power generation and extraction but
at sufficiently low energy/particle fluence such that the components should experience minimal
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Griddegradation by the fusion environment. A list of goals for the Phase 1 operation are also provided inTable 3.1.
The Phase 2 operation focuses on achieving a full environmental cycle for the materials andcomponents. The structural materials of the first wall and blanket will degrade under neutron
bombardment. One can use a well characterized material such as low-activation ferritic martensitic alloys
to estimate the requirement of this phase. Confidence exists that these materials can adequately perform
up to doses of 50 displacements per atom (dpa) and 500 ppm He accumulation within the temperature
range from 400 to 550°C arising from fast neutron-induced transmutation. For 14 MeV neutrons from DT fusion this translates to an incident neutron energy fluence of ~5 MW-year m−2 at the first wall
surrounding the fusion plasma. The optimal materials/technology choice of other key components such as
the plasma facing components for the divertor, first wall armor, and associated active cooling methods
that can meet the power exhaust, material erosion and tritium retention requirements are less certain at
this time. Therefore, the Phase 2 requirement is to meet a neutron wall loading of 1 to 3 MW-year m−2 on
the PFC armor and 2 to 3 MW-year m−2 on the structural materials of the vacuum vessel and breedingblanket such that modifications to the structural materials and first wall components will be significant
and measurable, but are not expected to result in failure of the components and entail their immediate
replacement.
This leads to the possibility of introducing a Phase 3 of pilot plant operation that would have thegoal of further defining the mean time to failure as well as providing the option to serve as a component
test facility to evaluate the performance of advanced materials and technology in the complex fusion
neutron environment, which includes significant cyclic stress, chemical compatibility and neutroninduced materials degradation challenges. To enable Phase 3 operations with the mission of testing
advanced technology, the pilot plant could be designed with more extensive remote maintenance andreplacement of sectors of the PFC/divertor, structural and blanket components capabilities toaccommodate different technologies.
Finding: A necessary and critical design feature of a pilot plant will be the strategy, cost and timescale ofremoving and replacing materials components degraded by the fusion environment.
The goals for material performance in pilot phases are summarized in Table 3.1.
FUEL AND ASH
Fusion produces net energy through nuclear reactions of various light isotopes that eventually
result in helium. For example, our sun primarily produces energy due to the fusion of four hydrogen
nuclei into a single helium nuclei, through a chain of reactions that involves the intermediate productionof helium-3 and deuterium, the stable heavier isotope of hydrogen. Alpha particles are the mostenergetically favorable end state of fusion due to fundamental nuclear physics. Therefore, subsequent
fusion of alpha particles is negligible and it is considered the “ash” of fusion energy. The fact that the
primary end product of fusion is a stable, inert gas with no safety or disposal concerns is one of fusionenergy’s most attractive features.
Terrestrial fusion sources do not use stellar fuel cycles based solely on hydrogen since they are
too slow and generate low power density. Other fusion fuel combinations are considered that have higher(but variable) reaction rates and immediate products such as: D-T fusion resulting in a helium andneutron, deuterium-deuterium (D-D) fusion producing helium-3 (also stable), tritium, neutrons, andprotons, deuterium-helium3 (D-3He) fusion producing alpha particles and a proton and proton-boron (p11
B) producing three alphas. The various combinations of these reactions, their immediate products andthe helium ash make up the fusion fuel cycle. The production of energetic neutrons and gamma rays
results in machine activation, leading to concerns for radioactive material disposal, and material radiation
damage induced degradation as discussed in the previous section.
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TABLE 3.1 Goals for Material Operation During Phase 1 and 2 of a Fusion Pilot Plant. Phase 3 has thesame goals as Phase 2 with the addition of more environmental cycles and/or modified materials andcomponents.
Component
Phase 1 operation
Phase 2 operation
PFC/divertor/first• Demonstrate ability to successfully• Demonstrate heat removal,
wall armor
remove heat flux for durations onmaterial erosion and tritium loss
the order of hours/days for compact
can be sustained for an
fusion pilot plant power densities
environmental cycle• Demonstrate net erosion yield ≤1• Demonstrate structural integrity
mm/effective full power year
for neutron wall loading on theorder of 1 to 3 MW-year m−2• Demonstrate sufficiently low tritium
losses in PFCs such that external
tritium inventory is maintained for
power operations and effluents
remain within regulatory limits.
• Demonstrate robustness to expected
fast and thermal helium ion
implantation in PFCs.
Structural materials • Demonstrate integrity during• Demonstrate structural integrity tomultiple operating cycles ofa neutron wall loading up to 2-3
relatively short duration (relatively
MW-year m−2
low neutron fluence but at neutron• Demonstrate remote
flux comparable to Phase 2)
maintenance/replacement ofcomponents• Establish lower bound on meantime to failure of structuralcomponents
Blanket materials• Demonstrate power extraction• Demonstrate tritium generation
with TBR > 0.9 averaged over an• Demonstrate ability to generate andenvironmental cycle
recover tritium with sufficiently low
tritium losses such that external• Demonstrate tritium losses <1%
tritium inventory is maintained forof tritium consumption averaged
power operations and remain withinover an environmental cycle
regulatory limits• Establish lower bound limit on
mean time to failure of blanket
structural materials due toenvironmental degradation
Ash Removal
Helium ash removal is required for all fusion fuel cycles. The helium is born as a nucleus (alpha)at extremely high kinetic energies in the fusion plasma, constituting some fraction of the fusion energy.
The helium ash must be removed at a steady state rate from the fusion plasma system, and replaced withthe fusion fuels, to maintain a constant fusion power. The helium is eventually removed as a neutral gas
particle at near room temperature in a region outside of the fusion plasma, typically a pump adjacent toplasma-facing components where the helium ions are neutralized into helium atoms. The helium ash
undergoes varying degrees of energy loss before impinging on the PFCs. The impingement generally
poses a significant challenge to materials because helium, as an inert element, is insoluble in materials. If
the helium is promptly lost to PFCs near its birth energy (4.5 MeV) it will deeply embed in materials and
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridcause blistering and spallation that results in material loss, while also causing high local heat flux. In
some configurations the helium ash is at intermediate energies (> keV) and this can produce helium
bubbles and cavities in the material, which can degrade thermal conductivity and drive swelling of thematerial. In a common configuration, called the divertor, the helium is at low energies (10-100 eV) but
high flux density which causes major surface modifications such as the growth of tendrils in PFC
refractory metal surfaces.
The coupled issues of ash removal and the evolving viability of PFCs due to helium
bombardment will be a critical requirement to demonstrate in all fusion pilots, regardless of configurationor fuel cycle.
Conclusion: The ash removal concept has to be demonstrated in a pilot plant and should beapplicable to the FOAK.
Conclusion: The viability of plasma-facing components to withstand the damage caused byhelium ash particles should be demonstrated in a thermal and particle environment representativeof a FOAK.
D-T Fuel Cycle
D-T is the most common fusion fuel cycle presently under consideration due to its relatively highreactivity (10 to 100 times higher than the other fusion reactions at 100 million degrees) and high energy
gain per reaction. Tritium has a short half-life of 12.3 years, decaying into helium-3, and therefore nonatural source of tritium exists. In D-T fusion the resulting 14.1 MeV neutron, which carries 80% of thefusion energy, is slowed down in a surrounding blanket and forced to undergo another reaction, mostly
with lithium-6, which produces a helium atom and a tritium. The ratio of tritium produced in the blanket
to the D-T neutrons is called the tritium breeding ratio (TBR). TBR must be at or above unity in order tohave the D-T fusion power plant sustain itself, noting that its consumables are deuterium and lithium.
Detailed calculations of the neutron interactions in the blanket show that TBR can exceed unity due to thepresence of other neutron reactions, which also increase the thermal power by an energy multiplier M
compared to fusion power (Figure 3.1). This excess is important since it is envisioned to be the source of“starting” tritium for subsequent fusion power plants.
Finding: The scale and rate of tritium use, breeding, and processing will be a major design
feature and challenge of a D-T pilot, and in particular achieving an effective tritium breeding ratio>0.9 in the second phase, which is consistent with the availability of external tritium fuel for
operations.
The present world inventory of commercially available tritium is highly limited (~40 kg), andlargely produced as a by-product of heavy water fission plants (Figure 3.2). While Ontario has committed
to, and is in the process of refurbishing 10 of its 18 CANDU reactors, the tritium supply from CANDUs
past ~2040 has large uncertainty. In addition, the ITER fusion project will store ~4 kg of tritium andconsume ~12 kg but not breed tritium in any significant quantity. The deployment of advanced fission
reactors that could produce tritium is also unclear. The uncertain tritium production/recovery of the next
20 years, coupled to 12.3 year half-life of the tritium, motivates proceeding with the construction andoperation of a pilot plant as soon as practical.

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FIGURE 3.1 (Top) Schematic of tritium fuel cycle. (Bottom) Neutronics calculations for tritium
breeding ratio (TBR = tritium produced per source neutron) and energy multiplier (M = thermal
power/fusion power) of idealized D-T blankets of varying composition. SOURCE: Reprinted from M.E.
Sawan and M.A. Abdou, “Physics and Technology Conditions for Attaining Tritium Self-Sufficiency for
the D-T Fuel Cycle,” Fusion Engineering and Design 81: 1131-1144, 2006, Copyright 2006 withpermission from Elsevier.

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FIGURE 3.2 Projected tritium fuel inventory from heavy-water fission plants with ITER beginning D-T
operations in 2035 with different scenarios about plant availability and T recovery ranging frompessimistic (red) to moderate (blue), to optimistic (green). CFETR is a Chinese proposed fusion
experiment/pilot assumed to begin operations in 2041. The blue bar is an estimate of the start of the EU
DEMO. SOURCE: M. Kovari, M. Coleman, I. Cristescu, and R. Smith, Tritium resources available forfusion reactors, Nuclear Fusion 58(2): 026010, 2018, © 2017 EURATOM.
Finding: Securing sufficient tritium supplies and producing excess tritium is critical to fusion’s
growth path through a pilot plant to a FOAK to an nth-of-a-kind (NOAK) power plant.
Some advanced fission reactors, specifically fluoride salt cooled high temperature reactors(FHRs) and some molten salt reactors use fluoride salt coolants that contain lithium and produce tritium
at rates comparable to heavy water reactors. Because these advanced fission reactors require systems fortritium control and recovery, they may have capability to extend tritium supplies and also demonstrate
tritium control and recovery technologies that can be used in fusion power plants.
Finding: Advanced fission reactors that use lithium-bearing fluoride salts (such as FHRs) may
provide a bridge source of tritium and demonstrate tritium control and recovery applicable tofusion power.
The rate of tritium production in a D-T pilot plant breeding blanket represents a significant stepup from present commercial experiences. For example, a 500 MWth fusion system burns ~75 g of tritium
per day or 28 kg/full power year. With a TBR~1 this implies the production of ~75 g tritium/day in theblanket, the recovery and processing of this tritium, and its recycling back into the D-T fusion plasma(Figure 3.1. This can be compared to the CANDU 650 MWe fission reactor which produces ~150 gT/year in the heavy water moderator. This tritium is periodically (~annually) removed and stored. The
entire 12 GWe CANDU Ontario fleet produces ~2.5 kg/year which due to the tritium decay results in a
steady-state ~30 kg inventory, representing the majority of the world’s supply. From this comparison
several insights emerge.

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Finding: The need for sufficient tritium self-production in a pilot is because the available
world’s supply of tritium is of the same order as a D-T pilot plant’s annual tritium consumption.
A D-T pilot plant operator will need to procure sufficient tritium to startup the facility.
There are presently many blanket concepts being considered to meet the simultaneous demandsof fusion power removal, neutron shielding and tritium breeding. Concepts include a variety of solid andliquid blankets in various configurations to achieve these goals (Figure 3.1), however all concepts are at
low technology readiness level (TRL). Furthermore, this low readiness has to be addressed since among
other reasons it has significant design implications regarding the maintenance scheme for the pilot plant.
The choice of coolant and the range of operating temperature of the blanket is important for overall
efficiency of the pilot plant and this has far reaching consequences on the design performance of theblanket. The blanket also serves as a primary component in shielding sensitive components, such as
magnets, from the deleterious effects of neutrons and high-energy photons. The radial thickness of theblanket is a key consideration in setting the overall size of the fusion pilot plant.
Finding: Advancing blanket technology readiness is required in order to select the blanket
concept for a fusion pilot plant.
The required inventory of tritium at a fusion pilot site depends on several design features. The
first feature is the burn fraction, i.e., the fraction of tritium injected into the fusion plasma that undergoes
fusion. This fraction will be small because the helium ash must be kept at a low concentration (<10%) in
the plasma and therefore most of the exhausted particles (>90%) are un-burned deuterium and tritium
atoms which must be processed and put back into the plasma. Burn fractions can be as low as 1% which
would necessitate 7,500 g of tritium to be processed per day at 500 MW fusion power. Developing a
direct purification and recycle loop (i.e., direct internal recycle) as closely coupled as possible to thefusion device would be the most effective way to reduce fuel cycle building inventory. The removal ofash and non-fuel impurities in this process stream is difficult and has to be addressed.
Finding: Innovations in boundary plasma science, fueling technologies, and gas processing will
be important for a pilot plant to decrease the cost and scale of tritium processing equipment.
The second important feature is the characteristic timescale to process the exhausted D-T mix andthe tritium recovered from the blanket. The third design feature is the amount of tritium which is retainedin materials inside the fusion reactor such as PFCs and blanket materials. Tritium permeates all materials
to various degrees, so tritium confinement barriers are a necessity as the large components of the core
could accumulate a significant quantity of tritium. Together these features determine the tritium residingin the plant because the tritium fuel in the plasma core is negligible (<1 g). Furthermore, they define therequired minimum “starting” inventory of tritium fuel which is important for the plant’s power
availability in case of a shutdown or for the start of a new fusion power plant. There is a strong
motivation to decrease tritium site inventories at a pilot to decrease the licensing burden, improve safety
and enable easier start and restart of a pilot and fusion power plants.
Finding: It will be desirable for a D-T pilot plant to have a tritium inventory ≤1 kg, which
reduces the release potential, offers more flexibility for siting, and reduces the demands on theexternal tritium supply.
Tritium purification, handling, isotope separation and storage systems have historically beendeveloped as batch or semi-continuous processes since this provides a cost-effective approach for the
relatively low processing rates required for non-fusion applications. The need to demonstrate continuous
operation of these systems in a D-T fusion pilot plant will also likely require continual operation of thetritium processing system, which has not yet been demonstrated. Effective recovery of tritium from the
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridblanket is an important part of tritium processing. Permeation, solubility and materials handling issues
with lithium containing metals and salts will need to be resolved since all blanket concepts facechallenges and presently have low TRL.
Finding: A fusion pilot’s integrated tritium processing rate will be 10-100x faster per day thanpresent experience in heavy-water moderated fission.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should establish and demonstrate efficient
tritium processing technologies at relevant rates and processing conditions before operationof a pilot plant.
Strict tritium management will be required for a D-T fusion pilot plant to meet regulatory controls
and site limits, ensure compliance with safety bases, and to maintain continuous facility operation.
Previous operational experience with tritium in fusion facilities has been limited to Tokamak Fusion Test
Reactor (TFTR) and Joint European Torus (JET), where the lifetime inventories were ~100 g. Tritium
accountability for these machines was burdensome. A D-T pilot plant will have a tritium throughput ofseveral kilograms a day and will have tritium breeding in the blanket. ITER’s tritium accountancy process
requires collection of all the tritium into hydride beds for calorimetry, which is not directly feasible for acontinuously operating pilot plant.
Finding: The requirements for tritium accountability in a fusion pilot plant must be clearly
defined along with analytical methods that can satisfy accountability requirements.
Alternative Fuel Cycles to D-T
The technology challenges that face alternative fuel cycles are less defined because most research
efforts to date have concentrated on the D-T cycle. Nonetheless, alternate fuel cycles have been proposedand studied such as D-D and p-11B that have abundant terrestrial fuel sources, and D-3He which likely
requires a lunar source of 3He for FOAK power plants. The U.S. He-3 inventory is ≈20 kg and would becapable of producing ≈400 MWth-y. Additional inventory would be required for the processing system.
This quantity of He-3 appears to be sufficient to complete Phase 2 of the pilot operation for the minimum
electrical power but may limit Phase 3. There are additional resources available of He-3 from the decay oftritium produced in the CANDU reactors but these have not been assessed.
The most significant design advantage of these alternate fuel cycles is removing the requirement
for tritium production/breeding and recovery from the reactor blanket. Conversely these fuels havehundred-fold lower reactivity rates at 10 keV (100 million degrees) where D-T achieves net energy gain,
and therefore alternate fuels require both higher plasma operating temperature and much higher triple
product (Figure 3.3).
As well, (Figure 3.3) shows that alternate fuels have a lower fraction of fusion power released as
neutrons. In some fuel cycles varied amounts of tritium are produced, and in all the fuel cycles someneutrons are produced either directly (D-D) or as side reactions that occur in the plasma, and therefore
issues associated with tritium (radiological safety) and neutrons (activation, volumetric damage) are noteliminated but reduced to a variety of degrees. These alternate fuel neutrons are also of lower energy thanthose produced by D-T, decreasing transmutation rates, especially 4He production. Therefore, alternate
fuels feature lower demands on neutron tolerant materials, activation and tritium safety than D-T.
Conversely the alternate fuels face more severe global design challenges for PFC surface heat removal
since a larger fraction of the fusion energy is released as charged particles or photons (neutrons
volumetrically heat a D-T blanket). Alternate fuel cycles often feature concepts that use open magnetic
topologies and linear systems in order to meet this challenge, yet these have less experimental vetting
than closed magnetic topologies. Direct energy conversion which converts the charged particle and
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plasma radiation directly to electricity, is an example of an innovative technology that could be applied tothis challenge. Technology and science innovations must also be compatible with helium ash control andremoval.

FIGURE 3.3 The reaction cross section times the total energy released from the most studied
advanced fusion fuels (1a). The total fusion energy released in neutrons from three of the moststudied advanced fusion fuels (1b). NOTE: Data from H.S. Bosch and G.M. Hale, “Improved
Formulas for Fusion Cross-Sections and Thermal Efficiencies,” Fusion Technology 32: 611-631,
1992, W.M. Nevins and R. Swain, “The Thermonuclear Fusion Rate Coefficient for p-11B
Reactions,” Nuclear Fusion 40: 865, 2000, and R. Feldbacher, “The AEP Barnbook DATLIB,” IAEA
Report INDC(AUS)-12/G, Vers. 1, 1987. SOURCE: Courtesy of John Santarius, University of
Wisconsin, Madison.
Finding: The use of alternate fusion fuels removes the need for tritium breeding and reduces therequirement for neutron-tolerant materials in a fusion pilot plant.
Finding: The use of alternate fuels requires much higher ion temperatures and fusion triple
product than D-T in a fusion pilot plant, and will likely require novel surface energy removal
technology and configurations.
RELIABILITY AND AVAILABILITY
The pilot plant should provide operational and test data needed to assure reliability for thesubsequent FOAK commercial demonstration plant, which must be capable of operating with highavailability (eventually over 85%). High reliability and availability will be an expectation for commercial
customers based upon performance now achieved by existing fission power plants. A major focus forreliability will be to achieve very low forced outage rates. Scheduled maintenance outages for repairs,
refurbishment and component replacements are expected and accepted, because they can be scheduledduring periods of seasonal low energy demand. But the ability to complete scheduled maintenanceoutages expeditiously, in time periods of several weeks will be preferred.
Reliability involves both short-term and long-term phenomena. Operations in the pilot plantshould be expected to occur in phases, including commissioning, initial low power and transient testing(Phases 1a/1b). An important point is that full tritium self-sufficiency is not required during this phase.
However, subsequently the pilot plant must operate at full power in Phases 2 and 3 with availability
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greater than 50% to demonstrate reliability of those components that require periodic replacement throughat least one full environmental cycle. Operating durations beyond one full environmental cycle will
enable assessment of component lifetimes and assessment of the replacement/repair times and cost.
Tritium consumption for D-T systems during this phase will be sufficiently large that complete, or nearlycomplete tritium self-sufficiency is required. Alternate fuels will not be subject to this tritium breeding
requirement. Significant upgrades and plant modifications may occur between these phases.
Modern approaches to reliability engineering, including computational modeling and engineering
analysis to simulate plant assembly, operations and maintenance, that incorporate best practices andlessons learned from large-scale project construction and systems integration to perform engineeringcomputer aided design, structural analysis, and process and control modeling should be applied anddemonstrated. Fusion components such as plasma facing components, the structural materials for thevacuum vessel, shielding and blanket modules operate under severe thermal and radiation environments.
Substantial research and development has been devoted to structural materials performance under neutron
irradiation for these components, but design and integration into a functioning fusion power plant ishighly complex and is one of the primary objectives of a pilot plant.
Finding: A fusion pilot plant will need to demonstrate the ability to efficiently perform remote
maintenance and replacement in support of the design of a power plant, taking into accountdetails of the consequences of the fusion environment, such as material activation and tritium
retention in components.
Finding: The use of modular, replaceable components will be a highly desirable design feature ina pilot plant to improve its ability to test critical components and achieve high availability.
ENVIRONMENTAL AND SAFETY CONSIDERATIONS
Fusion provides the promise of a safe and environmentally acceptable energy source. These
attributes are key to the acceptance and overall economic competitiveness of fusion energy.
Demonstration of safe operation of the fusion pilot plant is one of its most important goals. In DT systems, tritium dominates the plant’s source term and mitigation of tritium release is key to the safetycase. There is significant experience with the TFTR 3 and JET operations, and with fission power plants(particularly CANDU reactors 4), as well as with the design of ITER, 5 that shows that tritium releases may
be kept within allowable limits via design and choice of materials. All fusion concepts produce intense
ionizing radiation. Neutron activation of structural materials will contribute to the source term in all
fusion concepts, but again, through design, and primarily through material choice, this portion of thesource term can be mitigated. The combination of source term plus pathway to release (e.g., via a large
release of energy) can be minimized via design and materials choice. 6
From an environmental perspective, minimizing waste volume and hazard overall, and avoiding
greater than Class C waste as much as feasible (and completely, if possible) in the pilot plant is key. In afusion pilot plant, greater than Class C waste can be avoided through the use of low-activation materials 7
and/or the use of alternate fuel cycles which lowers the material activation. The pilot plant may generatesome greater than Class C waste if some low-activation materials will not be fully qualified, but it should
demonstrate that the FOAK plant could use these low activation materials. 8 The fusion pilot plant will
generate radioactive products requiring disposal in a near-surface disposal facility, and its design shouldseek to generate the minimum volume of waste.

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REGULATORY PROCESSThe U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), an independent federal agency, regulates the
Nation’s civilian use of nuclear materials. This authority was granted the NRC by Congress through theAtomic Energy Act of 1954, as amended, hereinafter referred to as the AEA. 9 In 2009, the Commission
determined, “as a general matter, that the NRC has regulatory jurisdiction over commercial fusion energy
devices whenever such devices are of significance to the common defense and security, or could affectthe health and safety of the public.” 10
The NRC has not yet established a framework for fusion power reactors but is required to do soby December 31, 2027, per the Nuclear Energy Innovation and Modernization Act (NEIMA) which wassigned into law January 16, 2019. 11 Section 103 of NEIMA requires the NRC to “complete a rulemaking
to establish a technology-inclusive, regulatory framework for optional use by commercial advanced
nuclear reactor applicants for new reactor license applications” by December 31, 2027. NEIMA defines
an “advanced nuclear reactor” to include fusion reactors.
The NRC has begun to consider how best to regulate fusion power reactors and on October 2,
2020, the Commission directed the staff “to consider the appropriate treatment of fusion reactor designs in
our regulatory structure by developing options for Commission consideration on licensing and regulating
fusion energy systems.” 12 To this end, the NRC staff is evaluating three main approaches: (1) treat afusion power reactor as a “utilization facility”; (2) regulate the use of byproduct material at a fusion
facility; or (3) use a hybrid approach. 13 As a part of this process, the NRC held a public meeting October
6, 2020, jointly with DOE to discuss the regulatory framework for fusion. 14
Utilization Facility
The term “utilization facility” is defined in the AEA to mean:(1) any equipment or device, except an atomic weapon, determined by rule of the Commission to
be capable of making use of special nuclear material in such quantity as to be of significance to thecommon defense and security, or in such manner as to affect the health and safety of the public, or
peculiarly adapted for making use of atomic energy in such quantity as to be of significance to thecommon defense and security, or in such manner as to affect the health and safety of the public; or(2) any important component part especially designed for such equipment or device as determinedby the Commission.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has, in turn, defined “utilization facility” to specifically
include nuclear fission power reactors. 15 Thus, the existing technical regulatory requirements under 10
CFR Part 50, “Domestic Licensing of Production and Utilization Facilities,” have been tailored to nuclear
fission power plants. 10 CFR Part 52, "Licenses, Certifications, and Approvals for Nuclear Power Plants"
provides an alternative licensing process to Part 50 but references the detailed technical requirements ofPart 50.
Although the NRC’s current regulatory definition of “utilization facility” does not include fusion
reactors, the broad statutory definition provided in the AEA could permit a future determination by theCommission to include fusion plants within the definition of “utilization facility.” For example, in 2014,
the NRC used a direct final rulemaking 16 to modify the definition of “utilization facility” to include the
SHINE facility which is an accelerator-driven subcritical device used to irradiate uranium to produce
molybdenum-99 for medical purposes. 17 The decision to modify the definition of “utilization facility” andalso use the 10 CFR Part 50 framework primarily stemmed from the fact that the process involved thefission of uranium atoms (a special nuclear material 18) and the associated safety requirements such as
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criticality control, heat removal while operating and shutdown and containment of radioactive fission
products were determined to be applicable. 19
Fusion power reactor designs under development do not use isotopes of uranium or fissile
materials in their processes. The fuel types are isotopes of hydrogen, with lithium-containing blankets.
Fusion power plants cannot have a chain reaction. As a result, safety issues associated with fusion are
different from those associated with fission reactors and stem from control of relatively short-lived
radioactive material, such as tritium and longer-lived radioisotopes generated by neutron activation of
metallic materials in the structures. 20 If the NRC were to treat fusion reactors as “utilization facilities,” the
NRC would not need to use 10 CFR Part 50. Instead, the regulatory framework could be tailored to thehazards specific to fusion through rulemaking, as further discussed in the section “Hybrid Approach,”below.
Byproduct Material
In the AEA and in NRC’s regulations, radioisotopes used as fuel in a fusion facility, such astritium, or generated during the fusion process, such as tritium and activation products, are byproductmaterial. 21 This determination assumes the NRC would consider radioisotopes produced in a fusion
reactor as being produced in an accelerator. The regulatory framework specified in 10 CFR Part 30,“Rules of General Applicability to Domestic Licensing of Byproduct Material,” and 10 CFR Part 20,“Standard for Protection Against Radiation,” contains the requirements that must be met when handlingbyproduct material as would be necessary in a fusion facility. The regulations specify requirements forenvironmental protection, radiation protection of workers and the public, control of liquid and gas
effluents, training of staff, operating procedures and processes, decommissioning, and depending on theactivity levels present, requirements for hazards analyses and emergency planning and response.
The NRC uses a risk-informed regulatory process and as such scales its regulatory requirements
according to the risk posed to public health and safety from the facility and/or activity. The regulatory
framework in 10 CFR Parts 20 and 30 addresses the majority, if not all, of the radiological safety issues
associated with a fusion facility without the unnecessary requirements specified in 10 CFR Part 50. The
NRC is able to add any requirements necessary to provide reasonable assurance of public health andsafety through the rulemaking process. Use of 10 CFR Parts 20 and 30 allows Agreement States 22 toregulate the fusion devices unless NRC determines that its authority should not be delegated to the states.
Fusion devices not located in an Agreement State would be regulated by the NRC.
Right-sized regulation that ensures safety but is free from unnecessary burden is needed to enable
rapid innovation in fusion technology and for fusion to be an economically viable non-carbon emission
energy generation source. Provided the NRC determines that the material generated in a fusion facility
can be categorized as byproduct material, the existing regulatory framework provided under 10 CFR Parts
20 and 30 is well suited to fusion technology.
Hybrid Approach
In a hybrid approach, the NRC could develop a new regulatory framework through rulemaking
that uses aspects of 10 CFR Parts 20 and 30, classifies fusion facilities as “utilization facilities,” and uses
some aspects of 10 CFR Part 50, such as licensing of operators, if necessary. As such, the regulatory
framework would be tailored to the hazards posed by fusion and would only impose regulatory
requirements that the Commission deems as necessary to provide reasonable assurance of adequate
protection of public health and safety and to promote the common defense and security and to protect theenvironment.
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Finding: A regulatory process that minimizes unnecessary regulatory burden is a critical elementof the nation’s development of the most cost-effective fusion pilot plant.
Finding: Because existing nuclear regulatory requirements for utilization facilities (10 CFR Part50) is tailored to fission power reactors, it is not well suited to fusion technology.
Finding: The current regulatory framework used for radiation protection and byproduct material
provided under 10 CFR Parts 20 and 30 is well suited to fusion technology.
Decommissioning
Upon cessation of operations of a nuclear facility, the decommissioning process is initiated
whereby the facility is radiologically decontaminated and demolished. In the process, radiologicallycontaminated or activated materials are packaged and shipped to a licensed disposal facility as waste.
Structures and the site grounds are then remediated to ensure that any residual radioactivity remaining on
the site is reduced to a point of either unrestricted or under some circumstances, restricted use. The
facility license is then terminated. Decommissioning of nuclear fission reactors has been occurring
successfully and efficiently at many facilities. The NRC indicates on its website that approximately 100
material licenses are terminated each year. 23
Finding: A fusion power reactor will need to be decommissioned due to the presence ofradioactive material.
The NRC has extensive regulations that govern decommissioning of all nuclear facilities toprotect the workers and the public during the entire process and until the site is released for use. To planfor decommissioning, the NRC requires that license applicants provide assurance that they will havesufficient financial resources available to complete the process. 24 In such a case, a decommissioning
funding plan or a certification of financial assurance for decommissioning is required to be submitted
before a license is issued. The cost of the decommissioning depends on the complexity of the process andthe amount and type of waste requiring disposal and is accounted for in the decommissioning plan and in
the regulatory requirements. The classification of the waste depends on the concentration and form of thematerials. 25 The NRC requires that operations of a facility be conducted in a manner that minimizes
contamination as a means of reducing the complexity of the decommissioning process. 26 The TFTR
tokamak D-T fusion experiment was successfully decommissioned in 2002. 27 Advances in radiologicaldecommissioning techniques are being made every year in the areas of remote tooling for segmentationand packaging of large, highly activated reactor components and likely can be applied to the futuredecommissioning of a fusion power reactor. 28
Finding: Decommissioning of a fusion facility is not expected to present significant or new
challenges due to the vast experience in decommissioning of materials facilities and nuclear
power plants in the United States.
Most fusion designs will need to manage and dispose of tritium safely during decommissioning
which may be the most difficult issue that will need to be addressed if the tritium is mixed with long-lived
isotopes in such concentrations that it is classified as greater than Class C waste. 29 These isotopes include
carbon-14 and nickel-59 and niobium-94 in activated metal. High temperature treatment of the fusion

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components can be used to recover tritium, since it is desirable to recover the tritium for other fusion
plants rather than dispose of it.
For all fusion designs, low activation metals can be used to reduce the radiological hazard toworkers and decommissioning costs. 30 Currently, greater than Class C waste can only be disposed of in ahigh-level radioactive waste repository which does not yet exist within the United States. The NRC isconducting rulemaking that is considering whether some concentrations of isotopes exceeding Class C
limits can be safely disposed of in a low-level waste near surface disposal facility and this rulemaking
could reduce the complexity of disposal of waste containing greater than Class C waste. 31 If no repository
is available and the NRC determines that the greater than Class C waste generated at a fusion facility
cannot be disposed of in a low-level near surface waste facility, then prolonged storage may be necessary
until a repository is available.
If the waste contains only short-lived isotopes other than Ni-63, Sr-90, and Cs-137, then it cangenerally be disposed of in a low-level waste near surface disposal facility, currently licensed by an
Agreement State. 32,33 However, if the waste contains only short-lived isotopes including certain
concentrations of Ni-63, Sr-90 or Cs-137 then it would be classified as greater than Class C waste and it
may need to be stored on site for several years to allow for radioactive decay and/or blended to acceptable
limits and then disposed of in a low-level waste near surface disposal facility. 34
Finding: D-T fusion designs will need to manage, recover, and dispose of tritium safely duringdecommissioning. Tritium may possibly be mixed with other isotopes such that disposal in anexisting low-level waste near surface disposal facility may not be possible.
Recommendation: NRC should establish the regulatory framework, including thedecommissioning stage, for fusion power plants as well as the pilot plant.
ECONOMIC CONSIDERATIONSAs one considers new generation pilot electrical plants and their economic value, we can look at
how pilot plants have been funded in the past, their generating scale and what has driven the economic
value seen by the participants in developing these pilot plants. Table 3.2 compiles these results.
State, Local, and EPC Support
Vertically integrated electric utilities are physically tied to the regions they serve by the large
amount of infrastructure invested in their transmission and distribution network plus generation assets.
These utilities have a vested interest in ensuring they respond to the desires of the populace they serve by
being engaged in their communities, providing service at the level their customers require and providing
the type of generation their customers demand while they ensure reliability and resiliency. By responding
to their customer base with the lowest cost of service possible while providing the services required, theyobtain public support, political support and regulatory support. Unlike other industries, if they are toremain in this business sector, they cannot simply move to another state if they do not like the direction
being taken by their customers, politicians or regulators but rather must either work with them or sell theirfranchise to someone who does.
As a result of this relationship, state and local governments tend to work with energy providers as
they know how to attract industry to increase employment and improve the quality of life for the populace

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridthat they serve with the energy they provide. Given that electricity is fundamental to modern society thefinancial health of this service provider should be in the state’s interest.
Looking at past pilot plants in the United States from Texas, Mississippi, California and Virginia(Table 3.2) one can see where state plus local engagement has aided the development of these
installations. The support for these facilities has come in various forms such as investment tax credits,deferment of taxes, legislative support for cost recovery up to a defined amount and training assistance for
personnel.
Finding: The economic development within a state/region helps with business attraction,
retention, and growth so state and local governments work to assist industry that is located orwould locate in their state to grow a new industry. Fusion has this potential.
Engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) industries may participate as strategic partners
for the building of the pilot plant if the industry participants have a relationship and there is belief thatthey will partner on future generation facilities.
Finding: Developers, if located in a specific state that may increase employment with the
deployment and use of fusion technology, could participate in state incentives or federal
incentives and could see strategic value in participating with the fusion pilot plant.
Federal Support
Federal support of pilot plants of any new advanced generation technology is important. A recent example
is the October 2020 announcement of federal support for advanced fission concepts (Table 3.2). A fusion
pilot plant provides national security potential benefits of increased scientific knowledge that can support
other advanced applications for the nation, sustainability of fuel supply, enhancing the diversity of firmenergy sources for the future with the potential to assist with the restoration of the transmission system
plus development of a new industry to provide economic value to the nation as a provider of materials,
engineering and facilities to other countries.
As we have seen for other projects, the federal government has been actively engaged in cost
sharing. 35 Fusion should be considered as a payment-for-milestones as described in the recently enacted
bill HR-133 Sec. 2008. Other types of cost sharing include tax incentives such as federal tax credits,
production tax credits, grants to specific companies, enhanced rates of return for utility investments, R&D
investment through universities and National Laboratories, etc.
Finding: Federal support of pilot plants featuring a new generating technology like fusion iscommon and will be critical for fusion.
Generation Size and Cost
The cost of new technology pilot plants has varied over the years and with the generating
technology. Not surprisingly generating costs of pilot plants are typically above those for mature plants.
Table 3.2 below gives a snapshot of pilot generation projects, along with some of their costs to constructrepresented in 2020 dollars per MW. These examples help provide the proper context for a fusion pilot
plant whose goal is to accelerate the development of FOAK commercial plants. Indeed, it is this statedgoal of a pilot which differentiates it from fusion devices designed to address purely technical or scientificchallenges. Figure 3.4 shows, for recent examples from fission, that as the maturity and completeness of
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridthe design concept increases the absolute costs generally tend to increase. This example clearly illustrates
the importance of developing a mature design to develop a reliable cost and schedule basis, and obviously
motivates one to minimize the pilot’s scale and cost while still meeting its technical requirements.

FIGURE 3.4 Cost uncertainty for different levels of design maturity is based on the Association for the
Advancement of Cost Engineering International and the Electric Power Research Institute methodology
for recent large fission energy projects shows that as designs mature (Class 5 → Class 1) the cost
uncertainty decreases (left) but that the actual cost increases (right). This trend was consistent acrossdifferent generation technologies. SOURCE: The Future of Nuclear Energy in a Carbon ConstrainedWorld, MIT Energy Initiative, 2018.
The first consideration is total cost. The ability of individual investors and utilities to invest in apilot plant and/or FOAK depends on the overall cost estimate for the pilot facility. Their investment will
likely be based on the overall capital cost of the pilot facility and the firm’s capitalization capacity or risk
investment capability. Input to the committee indicated that only the largest U.S. utilities havecapitalization capacity that would allow ~$5 billion investments in a known technology, and manyutilities would be more limited than this in their total cost. An exception to this in Table 3.2 is Vogtle atmore than $25 billion cost. Vogtle uses well established fission technology so is not a pilot in that sense
but is listed because it was the first major fission build in a generation in the United States with adepreciated life expectancy of 40 years. It continues to face challenges even with substantial government
backing and its cost escalations provide a cautionary tale about large size and total costs. Conversely,
smaller investments will motivate utilities to purchase the technology while larger costs can risk theviability of the entire utility. This immediately suggests a similar limit, effectively set by the U.S.
electrical marketplace, for a fusion FOAK that even following a fusion pilot will be a relatively immaturetechnology. The maximum FOAK cost should be evaluated periodically based on input from the energy
marketplace, consistent with the final recommendation of Chapter 2.
Finding: On the basis of today’s energy market and costs, the fusion FOAK plant will need tohave a total overnight construction cost less than $5 billion to $6 billion in order to be viable in

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridthe present U.S. electrical marketplace with a projected operation life of at least 40 years for theplant.
Given this reality of the U.S. market, the next consideration is the total cost for the fusion pilot
plant. The pilot plant has linked technical and economic goals with significant private sector
contributions. The private sector developers must in turn follow the constraints of the marketplace inwhich they will deploy their technologies in order to attract investment. If the private sector, even withgovernment backing (Table 3.2), will not accept a total price past $5 billion to $6 billion for generating
technology already demonstrated at scale, then it will certainly not accept this for the pilot plant. In
addition, a pilot plant should have long term benefit to the industry’s development so the capital cost canbe depreciated over a long period of time.
A pilot plant does not need to generate power at the same level of a FOAK or NOAK, which
would be determined by economies of scale and marketplace demands for a mature energy technology.
The pilot plant will not be designed to demonstrate the normalized generation construction costs, $/MW,of a FOAK for several reasons. The first is that the technology readiness is less mature, which is the
motivation for building a pilot plant. Compared with other technologies such as fission, solar, power andoff-shore wind generation, fusion is at a lower level of technological readiness. The fusion pilot plant will
improve technological readiness. The second is that there are economies of scale that can be realized bydesigning and operating the plant at higher electrical powers. These can be realized by making the plantlarger on the basis of the same scientific and technological basis but will increase the cost. This is in
conflict with the goal of seeking to build the pilot plant at the lowest possible cost. An example of a
relatively low power pilot plant is the Dominion Energy Off-shore Wind pilot at 12 MWe. The
normalized cost was relatively high at $25 million per MWe. The higher normalized cost should be
expected at low power because some costs (permitting, design) are relatively insensitive to scale andrepresent a minimum cost. Nonetheless, there is a strong motivation to reduce the normalized generation
costs, $/MW, even for the fusion pilot plant. This is because it reduces the extrapolation to themarketplace. It will provide both the developers and utility operators greater assurance in committing to a
FOAK pilot plant. Projections of the normalized cost for a FOAK commercial plant will be a significant
consideration at the decision point to construct the pilot plant, discussed in Chapter 5. Hence, this metricshould be considered during the design phase of the pilot plant. Due to the changing marketplace,engaging experts in the electrical industry at the time of this decision would be valuable.
The levelized cost of energy (LCOE) for the FOAK power plant will be defined in large part by
the normalized generation construction costs, facility availability and the operation and maintenancecosts. Operating the pilot plant into a third phase represents an opportunity to improve our knowledge ofmean time to failure for components, better defining the operating lifetime in the complex fusion
environment and potentially testing advanced materials. It is important to note this benefit gained fromuse of the pilot plant must be balanced against the additional costs associated with Phase 3 operations.
The costs during the operating and maintenance phase of the pilot plant will provide valuable data toestimate the operating and maintenance of the FOAK power plant. While increased normalized costs areto be expected in the pilot plant due to the technological maturity, developing an integrated solution that
reduces the operating and maintenance costs and demonstrating it on the pilot plant would be
advantageous. This has implications for the design of the in-vessel components, including the blanket,
and remote maintenance.
Conclusion: A fusion pilot plant should have a generating power >50 MWe and total overnight
construction cost less than $5 billion to $6 billion.
This conclusion indicates a maximum normalized cost 100M$ per MW, which is more than fourtimes larger than the examples cited in Table 3.2. Such a high normalized cost for the pilot plant would
unlikely be sufficient to motivate funding for a FOAK. This motivates design efforts to decrease the
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normalized cost of the pilot plant and/or provide a clear pathway to reduce normalized cost through scaleor parallel technology improvements.
Siting is another important factor in cost. One would have to assume that due to the technicalchallenges associated with fusion technology, the cost to build a pilot plant would be similar to those ofadvanced firm generating plant pilots or the offshore wind pilot on a cost or MWe basis. If possible, asmuch balance of plant that could be repurposed from an existing generator facility that is being retired,but was properly maintained, could reduce the balance of plant expenses. If this is not possible then astandardized balance of plant design that could fit the overall balance of plant parameters that will enable
the operation of the smallest pilot plant capable of meeting the performance criteria. Given the need forsynchronous condensers, storage or standby generators to support some fusion plant designs, if a utility
has a location with synchronous condensers or storage nearby which this should be considered to support
the fusion pilot plant to reduce the overall cost requirement on a pilot facility. The present cost risk forfusion is the thermal side of the plant, not the balance of plant, so the value should be considered based on
the cost of the thermal side of the plant and using the minimum cost balance of plant design to provide
electrical energy. The balance of plant could have a cost profile as large as the thermal fusion core, andtherefore this is an important consideration for a fusion pilot to meet its cost goals.
Finding: For improved economics, the fusion pilot plant should take advantage of siting at
locations where previous generation plants have been installed to reduce electric transmission or
substation infrastructure expenses or be located at a government facility with excess electricalgeneration and load capacity to support its function.

TABLE 3.2 Historic and Recent Examples of Various Pilot Generation Plants
Year

Peak
Generation
MWe

Cost
2020M$/MWe

Total cost2020 B$

Pilot

Type

Shippingport

Fission

1958

60

10.9

0.65

Government, private
investment

Texas Clean
EnergyCoal GCC

2010

377

6.4–9.3a2.4–3.5

Government, private
investment

Kemper County
EnergyCoal+CC2010(2017)b582

12.9 a7.5

Government, private
investment

Callide OxyfuelCoal+CC

2012

30

9.1

0.27

Government, private
investment

Solar PV grid
scale

Solar

2005

Ivanpah ElectricPower Plant

Solar

2013

392

6.33d

2.45

Federal government load
guarantee, private investors

VogtleFission

2020

2500

10.4

25.9

State support and federal tax
incentives such as
production tax credits

6.7c,dSources / Drivers

Cost subsidies by federal tax
credit and some state tax
credits. Section 1603 grants
to solar companies.

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Pilot

Type

Year

Peak
Generation
MWe

Cost
2020M$/MWe

Total cost2020 B$

Sources / Drivers

Dominion
Energy Offshore Pilot

Wind

2020

12

25.0d

0.3

State support. $300 million
cost of this pilot wasapproved by the SCC as aresult of the Va.
Transformation and Security
Act of 2018.e

Natrium

Fission2020

345>9.3 f>3.2 fGovernment, private
investment

X-Energy

Fission2020

320>10.0 f>3.2 fGovernment, private
investment

NuScaleFission

2020

720

8.5

6.1

Government, private
investment

Not completed.
Switched to natural gas in 2017.
c
Average price.
dCapacity factor of these pilots are lower than those for other baseload pilot plants noted. Solar average for early plants were
between 13-19%, Ivanpah capacity factor 24%, Dominion offshore wind capacity factor 42%.
e
Based on economic development for future Off-shore wind plus transition to Virginia’s zero carbon goal by 2045. $210 million
in economic output, 900 jobs created for construction, 1,100 jobs created for O&M, $21 million in local government revenues.
fBased on publicly announced DOE total support of 3.2 B$ combined for the Natrium and X-energy projects with minimum
50% cost share from developers, and the cost split evenly between projects.
SOURCE: Shipppingport Atomic Power Station data from Wikipedia,
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Shippingport_Atomic_Power_Station&oldid=964406210; Texas Clean Energy,
Kemper County Energy, and Callide Oxyfuel data from World Nuclear Organization, https://www.world-nuclear.org/informationlibrary/energy-and-the-environment/clean-coal-technologies.aspx; Solar PV Grid Scale data from Lawrence Berkley Laboratory;
Ivanpah Solar Power Facility data from Wikipedia,
https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ivanpah_Solar_Power_Facility&oldid=977491449; Vogtle Electric Generating Plant
data from Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Vogtle_Electric_Generating_Plant&oldid=964406778;
Dominion Energy Offshore wind data from Hampton Roads Alliance, https://hamptonroadsalliance.com/wpcontent/uploads/2020/09/Offshore-Wind-Economic-Impact-Report-092820.pdf and VA SCC ruling: Case # PUR-2018-00121,
November 2, 2018; Va. Transformation & Security Act of 2018, https://lis.virginia.gov/cgibin/legp604.exe?181+ful+CHAP0296+pdf; NuScale data from https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/11/several-us-utilitiesback-out-deal-build-novel-nuclear-power-plant; NuScale is planning to increase the power by 25% to 924 MWe with minor
design changes without any major changes to the design. The cost per MWe and the total cost listed in this table are based on the
720 MWe design from https://newsroom.nuscalepower.com/press-releases/news-details/2020/NuScale-Power-Announces-anAdditional-25-Percent-Increase-in-NuScale-Power-Module-Output-Additional-Power-PlantSolutions/default.aspx?utm_source=nuscalepower&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=default-hero-1.
a

b

NOTES
1. See, for example, Menard et al Nucl Fusion 56 (2016) 106023.
2. See, for example, Sorbom et al Fusion Eng Design 100 (2015) 378; LaBerge J. Fusion
Energy 27 65.
3. C. A. Gentile, et al., 1996, TFTR Tritium Operations Lessons Learned, Fusion Technology
30: 1564-1566.
4. Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, Tritium Releases and Dose Consequences in Canada
in 2006, INFO-0793, December 2009.
5. R. Cristescu, et al., Tritium inventories and tritium safety design principles for the fuel cycleof ITER, Nuclear Fusion, 47(7), July 2007.
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid2001.

6. M. Victoria, et al., Structural Materials for Fusion Reactors, Nuclear Fusion, 41(8), August

7. D. A. Petti, et al., Re-evaluation of the use of Low Activation Materials in Waste
Management Strategies for Fusion, Fusion Engineering and Design, 51-52, 2000, 435-444.
8. L. El-Guebaly and Aries-ACT team, “Design and Evaluation of Nuclear System for ARIESACT2 Power Plant With DCLL Blanket”, Fusion Science and Technology, 72:17-40, 2017.
9. Atomic Energy Act of 1954 (P.L. 83-703).
10. SRM-SECY-09-0064, “Regulation of Fusion-Based Generation Devices” (Apr. 20, 2009)(SECY-09-0064).
11. https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/neima.
12. SRM-SECY-20-0032, “Rulemaking Plan on “Risk Informed, Technology-Inclusive
Regulatory Framework for Advanced Reactors” (October 2, 20202) (SECY-20-0032).
13. Bill Reckley, “Thoughts on NRC Regulatory Approach for Fusion”, DOE/NRC/FIA Public
Forum on a Regulatory Framework for Fusion, October 6, 2020, https://science.osti.gov/fes/CommunityResources/Workshop-Reports/NRC-Public-Forum.
14. Bill Reckley, “Thoughts on NRC Regulatory Approach for Fusion”, DOE/NRC/FIA Public
Forum on a Regulatory Framework for Fusion, October 6, 2020, https://science.osti.gov/fes/CommunityResources/Workshop-Reports/NRC-Public-Forum.
15. C.F.R. § 50.2 (definitions of “utilization facility” and “nuclear reactor”).
16. Definition of Utilization Facility, Direct Final Rule, 79 Fed. Reg. 62,329 (Oct. 17, 2014).
17. SHINE Preliminary Safety Analysis Report, Chapter 4—Irradiation Unit and Radioisotope
Production Facility Description dated May 31, 2013 (ADAMS Accession No. ML13172A265).
18. Title I of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 defines “special nuclear material” as plutonium,
uranium-233, or uranium enriched in the isotopes uranium-233 or uranium-235.
19. SECY-14-0061, “Direct Final Rule: Adding Shine Medical Technologies, Inc., AcceleratorDriven Subcritical Operating Assembly to the Definition of Utilization Facility”(June 16, 20).
20. Sandri et al., “A Review of Radioactive Wastes Production and Potential Environmental
Releases at Experimental Nuclear Fusion Facilities.” Environments 2020: 1-12.
21. See 10 C.F.R. § 30.4 (definition of “byproduct material”).
22. See https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/state-tribal/agreement-states.html.
23. See https://www.nrc.gov/waste/decommissioning.html s.
24. See 10 C.F.R. 50.75, “Reporting and recordkeeping for decommissioning planning,” and 10
C.F.R. 30.35, “Financial assurance and recordkeeping for decommissioning.”
25. See 10 CFR 61.55, “Waste classification.”
26. 10 CFR 20.1406(c), the NRC requires all licensees to minimize the introduction ofradiological contamination into the site environment to keep doses to as low as reasonably achievable andto facilitate decommissioning.
27. E. Perry; J. Chrzanowski; C. Gentile; R. Parsells; K. Rule; R. Strykowsky; M. Viola,“Decommissioning of the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor”, 20th IEEE/NPSS Symposium onFusion
Engineering, 2003, doi 10.1109/FUSION.2003.1426633.
28. Stenger, D et al. “Innovation in Decommissioning and their Application Abroad.” Nuclear
News July 2020: 45-52.
29. See 10 CFR 61.55, “Waste classification.”
30. Sandri et al., “A Review of Radioactive Wastes Production and Potential Environmental
Releases at Experimental Nuclear Fusion Facilities.” Environments 2020: 1-12.
31. Stenger, D et al. “Innovation in Decommissioning and their Application Abroad.” Nuclear
News July 2020: 45-52.
32. See 10 C.F.R. § 30.4 (definition of “byproduct material”).

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33. See https://www.nrc.gov/about-nrc/state-tribal/agreement-states.html;
https://www.nrc.gov/waste/llw-disposal.html
34 See 10 CFR 61.55, “Waste classification.”
35. See https://www.energy.gov/ne/articles/it-s-time-united-states-demonstrate-advancedreactors-0.

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4
Innovations and Research Needed to Address Key Fusion Pilot Plant Goals
It is clear that significant enthusiasm exists in the fusion community towards the proposed U.S.
strategy of developing, designing and building a compact fusion pilot plant, which would carve out aunique niche in the worldwide pursuit of fusion energy involving smaller physical size, lower power
output and lower capital cost. This enthusiasm is manifest in the recent fusion community planning
process 1 and the numerous private startup companies that have garnered significant investment and areworking to further the development of numerous fusion confinement and potential power plant concepts.
However, research aimed at developing a fusion-based power plant has, to date, focused mainly on theplasma physics and confinement itself, including the plasma, the divertor and first wall, as well as themagnets and heating systems. It is obvious that substantial innovations will be required prior tocompleting a detailed engineering design and site selection leading to a decision to begin construction.
This is necessary since private and public sector funding for fusion materials and technology, andcorresponding research activities, have been substantially lower than for fusion confinement concepts.
The desire to put fusion power on the grid in a pilot plant requires a significant investment into
the research and development of materials and fusion nuclear technology to increase the technicalreadiness to a level that enables a pilot plant. The attractiveness of a fusion system, in terms of
economics, safety and environmental considerations, is mainly determined by the materials and design ofsystems that will extract the fusion power and convert it to electricity and sustainably close the fuel cycle,
which in the case of a deuterium-tritium (D-T)-based reactor design includes the generation, or breeding,of tritium. At present, these systems for the divertor and first wall armor PFCs, and integrated blanket are
at a very low technology readiness level (TRL), and thus require substantial research and development.
However, as noted in the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee report on Transformative
Enabling Capability for Efficient Advance Toward Fusion Energy 2 there are numerous recent advances inadvanced materials and manufacturing, high temperature and/or high field magnets, and tritium
processing that offer the potential to significantly increase the TRL to enable construction and mitigate
risks towards the initial operation of a compact pilot plant.
The divertor, first wall and blanket systems for operation in a fusion power reactor represent asignificant materials development challenge resulting from the neutron-induced degradation, thermal
mechanical loading and corrosive environment. The operating environment envisioned for the materialsstructures for fusion energy far exceed those of current technology, including light water reactors that are
impacted by many materials degradation problems and expected in ITER as shown in Figure 4.1. 3,4,5,6
Figure 4.1 shows a schematic view of ITER in addition to calculations of the lifetime neutron fluence
expected for ITER components compared to the annual neutron fluence anticipated in the European
DEMO reactor, 7 and demonstrates that a demonstration reactor or pilot plant will experience neutron
fluences and degradation significantly greater than ITER. To date, numerous designs have been proposed
for fusion blankets to breed tritium, however, all such concepts are at a low TRL. An integrated strategy
is needed to develop and test the integrated first wall and breeding blanket concepts in time for readinessfor deployment of a compact, fusion pilot plant.

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FIGURE 4.1 Overview of neutronics calculation of (a) neutron fluence to components in ITER over theoperation lifetime and in 1 year of operation of a European DEMO reactor, (b) showing the position
dependent neutron flux. SOURCE: Republished with permission of Annual Reviews, Inc., from S.J.
Zinkle and L.L. Snead, “Designing Radiation Resistance in Materials for Fusion Energy,” Annual Review
of Materials Research 44: 241-267, 2014; permission conveyed through Copyright Clearance Center, Inc.
There are two inter-related motivations for innovations and research. The first is to ensure that the
key goals identified in Chapter 3 are met. The second is to use innovations to reduce the cost of the pilot
plant and improve the economics of a first-of-a-kind (FOAK) power plant. The required innovations
involve scientific and technical advancements, described below in the section “Scientific and TechnicalInnovations and Research Advances,” in order to demonstrate the required performance of the fusion
confinement concept, extract the fusion power and to sustain the fusion fuel cycle. The sections“Participants in Developing a Pilot Plant” and “Models for Public-Private Partnerships” discuss theopportunities for public–private partnerships, given the success of such technology development
partnerships including the NASA COTS program, and options for defining the private sector and federal
government development priorities.
Recommendation: To meet the challenge of having a viable design by 2028 and initial pilot
plant operation in 2035-2040, innovations in fusion confinement concepts and technology to
extract fusion power and close the fusion fuel cycle should be developed in parallel. This
will enable the engineering design of a pilot plant and the construction decisions to beaccelerated by a combination of government and private funding.
SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL INNOVATIONS AND RESEARCH ADVANCES
Virtually every major component of a future nuclear fusion energy reactor, except for structural
materials made of reduced activation ferritic-martensitic alloys, will require materials development inorder to provide confidence in the ability to withstand significant limits of essential material properties
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including: neutron damage, creep resistance, fracture toughness, surface erosion/re-deposition, corrosion,
chemistry, thermal conductivity and many others. Further, a particular challenge is the need to safely andefficiently close the fuel cycle, which for deuterium-tritium fusion designs involves the development ofblankets to breed and extract tritium, as well as the fueling, exhausting, confining, extracting, andseparating tritium in significant quantities. 8 Although this is often put off for the future, the goal of
economical fusion energy within the next several decades as a U.S. strategic interest 9 drives the need to
rapidly increase the research and development of enabling materials, components and fusion nuclear
technologies. Some of the capabilities needed for development and testing are straightforward and could
be prepared in the short term, but a full research program will require test facilities producing
environments increasingly similar to a fusion power plant to assess reactor-relevant power exhaust
handling in the fusion neutron environment.
In the 2019 report Final Report of the Committee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma
Research 10 (hereafter the “Burning Plasma report”), the higher magnetic field made possible by thedevelopment of demountable high temperature superconducting (HTS) magnets was identified as a key
enabling technology that provides a potential path, when combined with advanced operating scenarios, toa compact fusion pilot plant with high fusion power density, and high poloidal beta enabling highbootstrap current fraction. Input to the committee stated that there are numerous other fusion confinement
concepts that may provide a pathway to electricity generation.
Integrated simulation has long been an important part of fusion energy research, with many recent
examples of increasing physical fidelity in the Burning Plasma report. Advancement of the conceptual
fusion pilot plant design(s) towards a construction decision will benefit from modeling and simulation
incorporating multiple physics and multiscale phenomena with increasing fidelity into simulations toevaluate and refine design options. High fidelity simulation capability, validated by experiments, willcontinue to benefit from the emergence of exascale computing platforms, and can be employed both
directly, and to facilitate development of reduced models, including via artificial intelligence. Physics,
system and process models can be combined into comprehensive full device models which will likely
contribute to evaluating the operations and maintenance of the pilot plant. Likewise, the incorporation ofbest practices and lessons learned from large scale project construction and system integration, includingfrom ITER and recent nuclear fission power plants, in order to perform engineering computer aided
design, structural analysis and process and control modeling will provide an important opportunity to
optimize the design and integration of the fusion pilot plant. Such computational modeling and analysis
will increase confidence in the operation and reliability of complex pilot plant components, including thedivertor and plasma facing components, structural materials for the vacuum vessel, shielding and blanket
modules, as well as functional and diagnostic materials that operate under severe thermal-mechanical,
corrosion and radiation environments.
It is also important to note that to meet the aggressive development timeline to meet the 2050
timeframe of putting a FOAK fusion plant on the electrical grid, it will be required to rapidly develop new
programs and facilities to accelerate the scientific and technical innovation needed to finalize theengineering design of the fusion pilot plant.
Fusion Performance and Plasma Confinement
Producing significant net electric power from fusion requires achieving temperatures andpressures sufficient for high fusion power density, along with energy confinement times necessary tosustain those conditions with minimal auxiliary power. A high duty factor must be maintained for long
periods of time, up to several months in the latter stages of pilot plant operation to meet the availability
goals of a pilot plant.
To achieve practical applications to replace present electrical generating processes with fusion
will require us to make substantial progress in producing, maintaining, and heating of a burning plasma,
while keeping it confined without damaging the engineered systems surrounding the plasma. Fusion
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performance can be characterized by the fusion energy gain, or the closely related triple product of ion
density, ion temperature, and energy confinement time. For D-T devices operating near the optimal
temperature of 8-20 keV, a triple product of roughly 4–10 (in units of 1021 keV s m-3) is required toachieve the high fusion gain needed for net electricity production. Previous experiments on the JET, JT60U, TFTR and DIII-D tokamaks have achieved peak triple products of roughly 1, and sustained valuesof approximately 0.2 for several seconds, as shown in Figure 4.2. Stellarator experiments on W7-X andLHD have achieved peak values of roughly 0.1, and LHD has sustained lower performing plasmas formore than 1,000 seconds. Other magnetic fusion concepts, such as the field reversed configuration, havemade rapid progress but remain orders of magnitude behind the triple product values achieved intokamaks and stellarators. A combination of significant innovations enabling concept improvement, andincorporating technological advancements, such as HTS magnets, is needed to achieve conditions for highgain and long-duration or high repetition rate for pulsed systems at a scale that is potentially relevant forcost-effective fusion power production.

FIGURE 4.2 Diagram of fusion plasma performance versus duration of plasma operation shows thefusion triple product versus duration, with the product ni(0)τETi(0) proportional to fusion energy gain. The
highest performance is achieved for short duration. The longest plasma duration is achieved withsuperconducting magnets with sustained injection of external plasma heating power.TRIAM-1M (Japan)
has the world record in plasma sustainment of 5 h and 16 min. Tore Supra (France) was sustained formore than 5 min, and the plasma was sustained in the superconducting Large Helical Device (LHD) in
Japan for 48 min. SOURCE: Republished with permission of Springer, modified from M. Kikuchi and M.
Azumi, 2015, Frontiers in Fusion Research II: Introduction to Modern Tokamak Physics, Springer
International Publishing Switzerland; permission conveyed through Copyright Clearance Center, Inc.
Finding: Significant progress is needed in fusion plasma confinement to demonstrateuninterrupted operation of a burning plasma in a high-performance confinement concept.
Conclusion: Before proceeding to the final pilot plant design phase, a deuterium-tritium (D-T)
fusion concept should simultaneously demonstrate temperatures of at least 100 million degrees C
and a triple product greater than 2 (in units of 1021 keV s m-3), corresponding to a D-T equivalent
plasma energy gain >1.

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Conclusion: For alternate fuels, equivalent parameters needed for net plasma energy gain must
be demonstrated.
Conclusion: For long pulse and sustained concepts, the values of plasma energy gain should besustained for at least several characteristic plasma times including energy confinement times.
The specific innovations required to advance a concept toward readiness for a pilot plant varysignificantly with the characteristics of the concept. For brevity and concreteness, the remainder of thissubsection focuses on the tokamak, as it is closest to readiness in terms of triple product, and was
identified as the leading magnetic fusion concept in the 2019 Burning Plasma report. The following
considerations would have to be modified for other fusion concepts and fusion fuels.
In a tokamak, the toroidal component of the magnetic field is produced by external coils, which
will need to be superconducting in a pilot plant, to avoid the resistive losses associated with copper coils.
The other component of the confining magnetic field, the poloidal field, is produced by current whichflows in the plasma itself. In a pulsed tokamak, this current can be driven via an external solenoid.
However, if the tokamak is to operate continuously, the current must be driven by other means. A numberof technologies can be applied, but will require substantial additional development, as discussed in below
on innovations needed for plasma heating and actuators. If the tokamak can be operated at a high value ofthe poloidal beta (the ratio of plasma pressure to the pressure associated with the poloidal field), it can
produce a substantial fraction of the needed current via the self-driven “bootstrap” current. The larger thefraction of the current which is self-driven, the less need there is for external current drive, and its
associated recirculating power.
Fusion performance of a sustained tokamak can then be characterized by three key performance
metrics: (a) the fusion triple product, or fusion gain, which must be large enough for the plasma to
produce net electricity and be predominantly self heated by fusion products (i.e., “burning plasma”), (b)the pressure, which determines fusion power density, and (c) the bootstrap current fraction, which must be
high in order to avoid large recirculating power, which reduces net electric power, and enhances the heatload on material surfaces. Simultaneous optimization of (a), (b), and (c) requires both advanced
technology, such as HTS magnets for high magnetic field, and advanced physics, to simultaneously reachhigh normalized performance via optimization of design parameters such as plasma shape and aspectratio, as well as fueling and control actuators. In addition, fast particles must be well confined, andtransients such as disruptions and edge localized modes must be avoided or strongly mitigated.
Finding: Projecting regimes with confidence requires the development of theory and modelingtools, carefully validated against experiments, that are capable of predicting all the important
aspects of plasma behavior, using both reduced models and integrated simulations spanning alphaparticle physics, transport and confinement, stability, boundary layer physics, and plasma
material interactions.
Finding: All fusion concepts require significant innovations to address issues going beyond
simple fusion performance metrics. Key integration issues include confinement of charged fusion
products, exhaust of heat and helium ash, avoidance or strong mitigation of transient events, andintegration of a hot fusion core with a boundary region compatible with exhaust requirements andlong term survival of plasma facing materials.
Recommendation: As fusion concepts approach performance metrics required for a pilot
plant, the Department of Energy should support innovative facilities capable of solving key
integration physics issues including core-edge integration of a high fusion performance corewith a boundary consistent with long-term survival of plasma facing materials and exhaustof heat and helium ash. Support should incorporate extensive model and diagnostic
development, and model validation.
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High Heat Flux Challenge for Plasma Facing Components and First Wall Components
Power exhaust in high power density, compact fusion systems has two key challenges. One is theexperimentally observed narrow steady-state e-folding length of power flow in the scrape-off-layer(SOL). Since the peak heat flux at the divertor plate (qdiv) is inversely proportional to the power e-folding
length (𝜆𝜆𝑞𝑞 ), narrow power e-folding length gives rise to an excessive heat flux at the divertor plate.
Experimental observation shows 𝜆𝜆𝑞𝑞 ~1/Bp 11,12 where 𝜆𝜆𝑞𝑞 and Bp are power e-folding length and the poloidal
field at the plasma surface. Since Bp~Ip/ap, power e-folding length in a compact fusion device tends to besmaller. However, the high operating density of a compact fusion device is likely beneficial for enhancing
radiative cooling and to achieve detached plasma state.
Another challenge is taming the transient heat flux including those due to ELMs (Edge LocalizedMode). ELMs are an edge relaxation phenomena driven by the peeling/ballooning mode, whose onset isreasonably well understood and characterized. 13 ELM Suppression by methods such as application of 3D
magnetic perturbations in DIII-D 14 reveals the promise for minimizing the impact of transient heat fluxes
on the first wall, but much more research is required, especially for managing the heat flux challenge of acompact, high power density fusion reactor.
Finding: High plasma core power density presents a significant heat exhaust challenge for theplasma facing components, armor, and first wall in fusion systems.
Intensive experimental and theoretical research within the past several years has focused on theanalysis and testing of advanced divertor configurations such as the Snowflake (SF) divertor, 15 super X(SX) divertor 16 and Small-Angle Slot (SAS) divertor. 17 Further, as discussed by Menard and coworkers, 18 the recent low aspect ratio HTS FNSF/Pilot plant design successfully showed that the long-leg/super X divertor can be implemented for the outboard divertor leg in a compact fusion system. As well,
the SAS divertor tested in DIII-D has successfully demonstrated stable diverter detachment with acompact divertor geometry and indicates that a slot with a V-shaped corner is promising for a reactor. 19
Finding: Solutions are required to enable operation of controllable, dissipative boundary plasma
conditions in magnetic toroidal devices, in addition to developing predictive understanding ofdivertor heat loads and methods to accommodate or avoid transient heat loading and transport andmaterial migration in the plasma boundary/scrape off layer. Further, such solutions are necessary
to develop the requirements for in-vessel components such as plasma heating systems, plasmafacing components, and first wall armor.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support studies of the compatibility ofinnovative divertor designs in toroidal confinement concepts with divertor plasma
detachment, which can significantly relax the radiated power requirement, and including
the possibility of liquid metal PFCs.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support a research program and new
facilities, including linear devices for testing plasma facing components and non-plasma
heat flux testing platforms, to identify, evaluate, and finalize a high-confidence, robust
design for PFC and first wall armor materials, including both solid and liquid metal
options, that are compatible with managing steady state and transient power loading.
High-Temperature Superconducting Magnets
It has been known for many decades that access to high magnetic fields is an important
requirement for the achievement of magnetic fusion energy. Furthermore, for virtually all magnetic fusion
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concepts, the fields must be generated by superconducting magnets. In general, the highest magnetic
fields achievable in practical large scale superconducting magnets have been limited by the properties ofthe superconducting materials themselves. The two main well-established options are niobium-titanium(NbTi) and niobium-tin (Nb3Sn) with corresponding maximum fields approximately 7 T and 12 T
respectively. In recent years, industry has developed two new classes of superconducting materials forlarge scale applications, with far superior properties 20,21,22: namely, rare-earth barium copper-oxides(REBCO) and bismuth-strontium copper-oxides (BSCCO). The fields and current densities are both muchhigher than for NbTi and Nb3Sn.
REBCO is a recently developed superconductor applicable to large scale practical applications,with YBCO (yttrium-barium copper-oxide) a leading contender for fusion.20 YBCO superconductors
typically have the form of a tape consisting of multiple deposition layers. YBCO tapes have superior
electrical and mechanical properties compared to Nb3Sn, leading to significant interest and private
investment within the fusion community. The main disadvantages of YBCO superconducting tapes are
their high cost and the fact that it has yet to be demonstrated that they can actually be wound into large
scale coils, although substantial efforts utilizing both private and public funding are under way todemonstrate the performance of such HTC magnets, as well as effort on insulators and stabilizers.
However, it is important to build upon this recent investment to continue the development of HTC
magnets, as well as to better understand the response of HTS magnets to 14 MeV neutron irradiation.
Finding: The demonstration of sustained performance of HTS magnets at high field strength,
including the avoidance or mitigation of magnet quench with required structural strength/load
response, is required to contribute technological advances to multiple fusion confinement
concepts.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support a research program,including a facility for cryogenic neutron testing, to define neutron degradation limits on
HTS magnets and/or optimize neutron shielding of magnets and to demonstrate mechanicaldesign, magnet performance, and degradation limits of HTS magnets that impact multiple
fusion concepts.
Structural and Function Materials for First Wall and Vacuum Vessel Components
The scientific understanding of the neutron-induced degradation of reduced activation ferritic
martensitic (RAFM) alloys provides confidence up to a dose of 50 dpa/500 appm He (~5 MW-year m-2)
within the temperature range from approximately 400 to 550 °C, as shown in Figure 4.3. 23,24 Figure 4.3a
demonstrates the substantially lower volumetric swelling of RAFM, while Figure 4.3b shows theevolution of yield strength with temperature and dose, indicating that the yield strength and hence work
hardening is not changing above 450 C. 25 Figure 4.4 demonstrates that the radiation embrittlement isgenerally manageable up to a helium concentration above 500 atomic parts per million (appm), 26 that
corresponds to a neutron wall loading of ~5 MW-year m−2. This provides confidence in RAFM structural
materials for use in a fusion pilot plant, although the degradation service limit above this fluence is not
yet established.

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FIGURE 4.3 (a) Comparison of neutron radiation induced swelling of an austenitic stainless steel(annealed type 304L) and a 9-12% ferritic/martensitic steel in the temperature range from 400 to 550°C.
(b) Yield strength of ferritic martensitic steels, including the reduced activation ferritic martensitic alloys
F82H and 9Cr2WTaV as a function of temperature and neutron dose. Note the irradiation temperature andtensile testing temperature were approximately the same. SOURCE: (a) Republished with permission ofAnnual Reviews, Inc., from S.J. Zinkle and L.L. Snead, “Designing Radiation Resistance in Materials for
Fusion Energy,” Annual Review of Materials Research 44: 241-267, 2014; permission conveyed throughCopyright Clearance Center, Inc. (b) Reprinted from R.J. Kurtz and G.R. Odette, “Overview of Reactor
Systems and Operating Environments for Structural Materials in Fusion Reactors,” pp. 51-102 in
Structural Alloys for Nuclear Energy Systems, Elsevier, copyright 2019, with permission from Elsevier,
http://www.elsevier.com.

FIGURE 4.4 Predicted (lines) and measured (points) shift in the Master curve transition temperature
𝛥𝛥𝑇𝑇𝑜𝑜 , of reduced activation ferritic martensitic alloys, which is a measure of the increase in the ductile tobrittle transition temperature. SOURCE: Reprinted from Y. Dai, G.R. Odette and T. Yamamoto, “The
Effects of Helium in Irradiated Structural Alloys,” pp. 141-193 in Comprehensive Nuclear Materials(R.J.M. Konings, ed.), Elsevier, 2012, copyright 2012, with permission from Elsevier,
http://www.elsevier.com.
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However, RAFM materials have not been fully demonstrated in the complex environmentalloading conditions of a fusion pilot plant, which include multiple combined degradation modes including
neutron degradation, He and H gas generation from nuclear transmutation, injected ions and permeating
tritium, significant and potentially time varying heat flux, complex mechanical loading, magnetic fields
and corrosive coolants, including the effects of radiolysis. Materials development efforts must focus on
meeting all the requirements of a recognized code standard. Experience gained with licensing thestructural materials of the cryostat, first wall armor and vacuum vessel of ITER can be applied to thefusion pilot plant. Although it is important to note that the pilot plant will not likely use the samematerials, nor involve water cooling, and thus is expected to operate at higher temperatures for which no
established code basis exists for materials licensing. The structural design criteria developed for ITER,
and already being used for other fusion concept designs, can provide a starting point for the design of apilot plant. Thus, robust mechanical property, corrosion, fabrication, and irradiation effects databases willneed to be established that meet the requirements of appropriate regulatory authorities, including thoseconsisting of high temperature and time varying stress state. This necessitates significant materials
research and development to enable the design and function of all in-vessel and ex-vessel structural andfunctional materials in the fusion pilot plant environment.
Finding: Confidence exists in the ability of low-activation ferritic martensitic alloys to survive
D-T neutron-induced degradation up to a dose of 50 dpa/500 appm He (~5 MW-year m-2) attemperatures between 400 and 550°C; however, partially integrated testing is required to provide
confidence in the performance of reduced activation ferritic martensitic components to the cyclicloading and environmental degradation required for Phase 1 and 2 operation of the pilot plant.
Finding: Due to the anticipated higher operating temperature of a fusion pilot plant, the design
criteria and licensing will be significantly different than for light water fission reactors or ITER,
and will require development to address unique components, higher operating temperature andtime varying stress state, corrosive coolants and stress/temperature gradients.
Recommendation: The materials engineering community, supported by the fusion
community and the Department of Energy, should develop high temperature structuraldesign criteria that incorporate creep, fatigue, and corrosion behavior of in-vessel and exvessel structural and functional components to enable the engineering design and licensingof a fusion pilot plant as part of the conceptual design activities.
Advanced manufacturing and complex material component design have transformative
potential, 27 yet research is required to move beyond the early stage of developing these alloys andcomposites. This includes investigating neutron radiation effects, chemical compatibility and corrosion,
response to plasma material interactions and tritium permeation, and component performance anddegradation in the complex neutron, plasma material, and thermal-mechanical loading conditions. Studies
will need to proceed from relatively simple single variable experiments to very complex, fully integrated,
multiple-variable tests prior to Phase 1 pilot plant operation.
For aneutronic fusion fuel cycles, the neutron flux and corresponding neutron-induced
degradation and neutron activation concerns are reduced by one to two orders of magnitude. However,new concerns are introduced by the much larger heat and ion particle implantation into the near surface
region of the first wall armor components. As well, the majority of the ion flux will consist of insoluble
helium, which can degrade near surface thermal and mechanical properties. The implantation of helium
into materials can cause blistering and spallation that can produce material loss. The maturity of materials
for applications in high heat flux and ion implantation applications in advanced fuel cycles is at a low
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TRL, that necessitates further research and development which should be defined as part of a moredetailed technology roadmap for such fusion concepts.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support a research program,including facilities to provide a limited volume prototypic neutron source for testing ofadvanced structural and functional materials and to assess neutron degradation limits of
RAFM alloys beyond 5 MW-year m-2.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support facilities for integrated
blanket testing in representative time varying heat flux, mechanical loading, and corrosive
environments, to identify, evaluate, and finalize a high-confidence, robust design forstructural and functional materials.
Innovations and Research Needed for Plasma Heating Systems and Actuators
A broad range of heating and current drive technologies have been developed and employed inexisting fusion experiments. These include gyrotrons and waveguides for electron cyclotron heating andcurrent drive, antennas for ion cyclotron and lower hybrid wave heating and current drive, and neutral
beams, including high energy negative ion beams. Examples of areas requiring further research anddevelopment include high frequency gyrotrons to enable electron cyclotron heating and current drive athigh magnetic field, antenna structures compatible with high neutron and heat flux, and beam injection
systems compatible with tritium breeding blankets.
Solutions for the plasma heating systems and actuators for a fusion pilot plant are not in hand. In
particular the normalized costs (dollars per watt) could be a significant factor in the overnight cost of thefusion pilot plant, while the electrical efficiency of the drivers/actuators clearly play a role in meeting its
net electrical power goal. In addition, the durability of these heating/actuator engineering components
exposed to the harsh fusion environment will be important to the operation times and costs of the fusion
pilot plant.
Finding: While ongoing advances in heating and current drive actuators have increased
confidence in their capabilities to effectively drive and control fusion systems, significant
progress is needed to demonstrate cost-effectiveness and compatibility with the needs of a pilot
plant.
Finding: A sustained pilot plant will require very high efficiency, months-long duration
operation for actuators used in the stationary phase. Innovations in physics, such as very highbootstrap fraction for tokamaks, and in technology, such as radio frequency and beam technologythat is both cost-effective and compatible with the neutron and heat flux environment, are needed.
Actuators must be robust, reliable and efficient for various phases of the operation in the pilot
plant’s fusion environment.
Finding: A pulsed pilot plant will require very high efficiency, cost effective, durable and insome cases high repetition rate, drivers. Large reductions in cost per joule over existing drivers
are required.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should invest in the development of actuator
technology, and supporting theory, that is compatible with the requirements of leading pilot
plant concepts.

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Innovations Needed for Closing the Fuel Cycle
A D-T fusion reactor cannot function without a closed tritium fuel cycle, and this represents afundamental feasibility issue for D-T fusion power production. Tritium provides a difficult species forcontrol, accounting, and safety, yet it is critical to the fusion fuel cycle. In order for fusion to realize its
maximum potential for safe operation and benign environmental impacts, high fidelity understanding of
all processes involving tritium is required. The tritium fuel cycle has a very broad footprint on any fusion
facility, which involves tritium burn fraction in the plasma, tritium processing time from plasma exhaustto fueling, the breeding of tritium in the blanket surrounding the plasma, extraction efficiencies from thebreeder and coolant streams, tritium losses from and inventories in the fusion core, near-core and ex-core
subsystems, and many more constitute a complex and interacting system. This is an essential capability
for a D-T fusion pilot plant, and advances in these areas are required to meet the ambitious goals of afusion pilot plant in the 2035-2040 timeframe.
There are presently many blanket concepts being considered to meet the simultaneous demandsof fusion power removal, neutron shielding and tritium breeding. A number of different blanket concepts
have been proposed, and include a variety of solid and liquid blankets configurations to achieve thesegoals, however all concepts are at low technology readiness. This low readiness has to be addressed, since
the blanket has significant design implications regarding the tritium breeding ratio, power conversion andthe maintenance scheme for the pilot plant. The choice of coolant and the range of operating temperatureof the blanket is important for overall efficiency of the pilot plant and this has far reaching consequenceson the design performance of the blanket. The blanket also serves as a primary component in shielding
sensitive components, such as magnets, from the deleterious effects of neutrons and high-energy photons,
and as such, the radial thickness of the blanket is a key consideration in setting the overall size of thefusion pilot plant.
Finding: Advancing the technology readiness of blanket technology is required in order to selectand optimize the blanket concept for a fusion pilot plant.
Virtually all of the technologies related to the tritium fuel cycle are at low technical readiness,with widely uncertainty in parameters that describe tritium migration through materials, across interfaces,
and its retention in bulk solids and liquids, and retention and behavior in plasma facing materials.
Extraction of tritium from either liquid or solid breeder materials is still highly uncertain, and thedevelopment of tritium barriers has been largely unsuccessful. ITER will provide a strong step in tritium
processing and the fueling/exhaust tritium loop, with higher amounts of tritium required in the future(relative to ITER). Breeder material behavior and interactions are still at a low level of understanding.
The breeding and recovery of tritium as it is processed raises a number of safety concerns toprotect workers, the public and the environment. Tritium is highly mobile, and can readily permeate
through metallic components, especially at elevated temperatures. ITER has a 4 kg maximum tritium
inventory (~1.5 x 1018 Bq). As noted in Chapter 3, it is desirable to minimize the tritium inventory to ~1
kg. Also due to the sustained operation of a pilot plant, continuous processing technologies will be
required. Expected tritium release limits are extremely low, and tritium needs to be accurately tracked toassure safety and proliferation. The grand challenges of tritium require improved scientific understandingof many interconnected phenomena including permeation, radiolytic chemistry, surface science andkinetics, liquid metal magnetohydrodynamics, and mass transfer. Systems and processes must be
developed that can efficiently and safely continuously process tritium at flow rates and quantities far
beyond current practice. Some of the technical issues associated with tritium control and recovery may be
addressed by advanced fission reactors using lithium-based molten salts, and progress in these fission
energy efforts may be applicable also to fusion systems.

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Finding: Maintaining low tritium inventory in a fusion plant is important for public safety,
licensing, and many other considerations. Technologies that can enable decreasing tritium
inventory in the fusion machine and the tritium processing plant are needed.
Direct internal recycling of tritium is one example of a technology with the potential to reduce
tritium processing rates and innovations that can enable direct internal recycling or similar technologies
will be important. One challenge with direct internal recycling is that many of the impurities damage orpoison known chemical processing methods and technologies for separation. Catalysis and removal ofthese corrosive species from the hot plasma is very challenging, but there are some potential avenues tobe explored. Another important part of controlling overall tritium inventory is minimizing the captive
inventory within the blanket material. The tritium must be rapidly recovered and kept out of collateralmaterials in order to minimize tritium inventory within the breeding loop. Direct internal recycling
technologies, blanket tritium inventory reduction, or other similar methods to reduce the tritium inventory
will need development before an FPP.
Finding: Improvements in tritium accountability methods that can be applied in continuously
operating fusion plants are needed and should be demonstrated in a fusion pilot plant.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support research projects with thesimultaneous objectives of reducing tritium inventory while increasing tritium processing
rates that incorporate concepts such as process intensification. Technologies should bedemonstrated prior to the construction of the tritium plant of a fusion pilot plant.
Demonstration of tritium breeding and extraction technologies in the fusion blanket will be
critical to the function of a fusion pilot plant and have not been demonstrated to date, although newadvanced fission reactors using lithium-bearing fluoride salts may address some key questions relevant toa fusion pilot plant. The specific tritium breeding and extraction concept that will be implemented in afusion pilot plant should be demonstrated during the design phase to provide reasonable confidence that it
will work within a fusion pilot plant. A demonstration should include the ability to mitigate materials
degradation of system materials due to exposure to blanket materials such as Pb-Li, FLiBe, or otherrelevant breeding blanket materials. If tritium extraction methods utilize halides, a method will need to be
developed to ensure no halides or other potentially reactive impurities migrate to the tritium systems (e.g.,
a fluorine or impurity removal trap).
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should support research projects and ademonstration to increase technology readiness and provide confidence that tritium
breeding and extraction technologies can achieve fuel sustainability. Technologies should bedemonstrated prior to the construction of the tritium plant of a D-T fusion pilot plant.
Finding: Tritium emissions from a fusion energy pilot plant need to be controlled to meet
applicable NRC guidelines. A fusion pilot plant should demonstrate implementation of tritium
emission control measures and demonstrate the ability to maintain emissions within NRC
guidelines for a FOAK or a pathway to achieve the required emissions reduction.
PARTICIPANTS IN DEVELOPING A PILOT PLANT
The design, construction and operation of a fusion pilot plant will require addressing scientific,
engineering and regulatory issues in an integrated fashion and requires a broad spectrum of skills. While
the United States is a leader in fusion research, the program has not built a facility of the scale of a pilot
plant. Thus, new additional skills beyond that which currently exist will be needed, while continuing to
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridleverage strengths of the program. The pilot plant teams would be composed of fusion developers,
component manufacturers, EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) contractors, universities,
national laboratories and potentially Investor Owned Utilities.
Large projects such as a pilot plant require strong teams of engineers, including systems
engineering, project managers and individuals with licensing experience. Some of these skills currently
exist within the program but will have to be augmented. Creating new teams is an opportunity to add
members with the requisite skills.
Embracing diversity, equity, and inclusion is key to building successful teams to solve thechallenges that fusion faces. This is multi-faceted, and at the highest level, means a team of people thatapproach these challenges from a multitude of viewpoints. Different viewpoints arise from many different
sources, including, but not limited to technical expertise, a person’s life experiences, gender, ethnic
background, age, and many others. It is important to note that diverse teams are more effective at solving
problems than those that are not diverse, however those teams must work together, otherwise they are lesseffective than non-diverse teams. 28 The recently released fusion community plan 29 recognizes this,identifying the cross-cutting opportunity to “Embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion, and develop themultidisciplinary workforce required to solve the challenges in fusion and plasma science.”
The need to embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion is not new, nor newly discovered. There aremany studies, including very recent ones, that support this conclusion, and provide evidence that while
there has been progress, we have a long way to go. Studies such as the National Academies studies“Promising Practices for Addressing the Underrepresentation of Women in Science, Engineering, andMedicine: Opening Doors” 30 and “Expanding Underrepresented Minority Participation,” 31 provide
actionable recommendations to drive positive systemic change. Change cannot happen without a visible
and obvious emphasis.
Finding: The need to embrace diversity, equity, and inclusion is not new, nor newly discovered.
Change cannot happen without a visible and obvious emphasis.
Recommendation: The participants in the development of the pilot plant should execute therecommendation of the Community Planning Process to “Embrace diversity, equity, andinclusion, and develop the multidisciplinary workforce required to solve the challenges infusion and plasma science.”
A continued tight coupling between the on-going research teams in the fusion program and thepilot plant teams will be needed. Universities have had a significant role in fusion research, have built andoperated experiments, and have been key in workforce development. This role needs to continue, withincreased effort on technology development, which had been previously reduced, and will now have to bestrengthened. Some of the universities have also played a major role in spinning-off privately fundedfusion developers.
Discussions with component manufacturers surfaced a need for funding stability as an important
requirement for their partnership in this effort. Companies are interested in working on fusion anddeveloping technology and tooling needed to construct components; however, past experience reveals thatindustry requires a stable revenue stream to attract, develop and retain the expertise that is needed.
Without such stability, the expertise that is developed in industry will go away. This has occurredpreviously in the fusion program and is another motivation for an accelerated program to ensure that theappropriate skills are developed and retained in industry.
National laboratories have played a large role in the fusion program ranging from scientificresearch and technology development, to operation of large magnetic fusion facilities. They operate
tritium facilities, including previously a D-T fusion facility, and have capabilities for siting nuclear
facilities. They also perform a broad range of research from basic to applied. Similarly, the NNSA has
operated facilities at national laboratories and at the University of Rochester to advance the scientificunderstanding of inertial confinement fusion. Experience gained at these facilities in addressing issues
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related to tritium handling and neutron production can benefit the fusion pilot plant effort and add
diversity in perspective.
DOE Fusion Energy Sciences has operated national facilities at national labs, industry anduniversities. PPPL hosted TFTR (D-T tokamak) and now the NSTX-U facility. A private company,
General Atomics, has built and operates the DIII-D National Fusion Facility on behalf of the Departmentof Energy. Similarly, a university, MIT, previously built and operated Alcator C-Mod. These DOE fundedfacilities have contributed to numerous scientific advances, and have achieved high values of the Lawson
parameter, approaching conditions required for fusion breakeven.
In the United States, there is far more private investment in fusion technologies today compared
to 10 years ago. This private investment is a positive development because it enables paralleldevelopmental paths, which is key to realizing success in this challenging technology. Private investors
expect a return on their investments. Milestones need to be achieved that demonstrate progress to goalusing a timeline that maps to market needs.
Most of the privately-funded fusion technology companies have tapped into the expertise at thenational laboratories and universities by directly funding work, by hiring staff from the national
laboratories or through new funding programs such as INFUSE and ARPA-E BETHE including
diagnostic teams and GAMOW, which is jointly funded by FES and ARPA-E. It was noted that currently
INFUSE only supports national laboratories.
Finding: Teams made up of private industries, national labs, and universities bring together
important strengths: industry brings the focus on deploying a usable product on a timeframe thatwill meet market needs, and national labs and universities bring innovation and deep technicalexpertise.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should further encourage access of private
industry to the broad range of technical experts resident at the national laboratories anduniversities.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy (DOE) should use and expand the newprograms to partner with industry in support of the pilot plant design, and DOE should
include all FES-funded researchers, including those at universities and private companies,
in the INFUSE program.
MODELS FOR PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPSOver the last several decades, fusion energy research has involved government sponsoredprograms, and for larger research efforts, international collaboration with the ITER program being thelargest and most sustained example. However, over the last two decades multiple private sector efforts
have been initiated to develop fusion energy concepts. The committee heard from the industry consortiumthat represents many of these companies, the Fusion Industry Association, along with representatives
from several companies developing fusion technology and concepts. As of today, over $1 billion ofprivate sector investment has already been made in fusion systems. 32
As noted in the “Economic Considerations” section in Chapter 3, a number of different federal
government cost sharing approaches have been utilized to stimulate new energy production technology,
including direct cost share, tax incentives, loan guarantees, grants to specific companies, ARPA-E
funding of public-private projects, prizes and payment for milestones. Although there are significant
differences in terms of technology maturity, the NASA Commercial Orbital Transportation Services(COTS) program has realized substantial cost reduction through an innovative cost and risk sharing
approach that involved a fixed-price payment-for-milestones contracting structure to private sector
companies working to develop crew and cargo space transportation capabilities. In parallel, NASAPREPUBLICATION COPY – SUBJECT TO FURTHER EDITORIAL CORRECTION
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pursued its conventional Artemis program to develop deep space exploration capabilities which could
also satisfy similar capabilities to low Earth orbit if necessary. One of the first COTS awards was in 2006
to the start-up company SpaceX, which had been founded in 2002. By 2008 SpaceX had conducted its
first successful launch of the single-engine Falcon 1, by 2012 it made its first cargo delivery to theInternational Space Station using the Falcon 9, by 2018 SpaceX had captured over half of the worldwide
market for commercial space launch services, and by 2020 became the first commercial company tolaunch humans to space. Successful technology development efforts funded by private investment involve
strong and positive public incentives to systematically address areas of technology and market risks withthe ultimate objective of purchasing a commercially viable, cost-effective product or service. Publicprivate partnerships using payment-for milestones contracting, versus traditional cost, plus fee
contracting, reinforce built-in incentives to be efficient, timely, and entirely success oriented. This is aprincipal reason that the NASA COTS model has emerged as a recommended possible strategy foradvanced fission energy 33 as well as for fusion 34 although other models have also been used fordeveloping advanced fission energy including loan guarantees and direct cost share agreements as being
pursued in the Advanced Reactor Development Program. 35 Furthermore, the recently enacted bill HR-133
Sec. 2008 has defined a milestone-based fusion energy development program.
Public cost-share support of private-sector efforts to develop fusion energy are well justified by
the long-term societal benefits of successful commercial deployment of dispatchable, sustainable clean
energy technology. However, it is important to note that SpaceX would likely not have been successful insuch a short timeframe without access to NASA’s technical expertise and key infrastructure including
launch range facilities. In the same way, it remains essential that DOE sustain a strong base program in
fusion energy science and technology, including supporting infrastructure and research at national
laboratories and universities, and pursuing development of a FPP as recommended in this report. As
discussed above the DOE Innovation Network for Fusion Energy (INFUSE) program and the BETHE andGAMOW programs are designed to enable private sector companies to access these capabilities.
Since the fusion program has not used a milestone based public-private partnership previously,
gaining experience with such a program would be valuable. The following two examples of research thatare needed is meant to illustrate how such a program could be applied.
The response of materials to neutrons in the fusion environment is of universal interest because
they are present in all fusion concepts, even though the relative fraction of fusion energy carried byneutrons and their energy varies. A particular challenge is faced in D-T fusion because the 14 MeV
neutrons are at a much higher energy than from fission and therefore the relevance of materials exposedin existing reactors is limited. Furthermore, it is important that the exposure environment (thermal,
chemical) is sufficiently representative of the fusion concept. Therefore, one must consider thedevelopment of dedicated capabilities and facilities that can determine the response of materials in afusion neutron environment. This can lend itself to a public-private partnership because there are bothscientific frontiers to explore and practical questions to answer for private fusion developers. If the
facility can serve a broad set of developers or concepts, the combined financial and technical resourcesfrom the government and private could be leveraged. Furthermore, the cost-effective design, construction
and operation of such a facility would be a target for a milestone payment program since the scientificrequirements of the neutron exposure are already well understood. This program could include cost shareson the near-term maturation of neutron source technology presently being developed in the private sector.
A related and synergistic topic is the response of superconductor magnets to the fusion
environment. Many fusion concepts rely on strong magnetic fields produced by electromagnets. These arealmost always superconductor magnets because they consume minimal electricity to operate. However,the fusion neutrons can affect the superconductors and therefore impact the overall performance andlifetime of the superconductor coils. Simultaneously, there are substantial and multiple efforts on thedevelopment of advanced HTS superconductors in the private sector. A milestone based public-private
partnership that focuses on the magnet performance evolution under neutron bombardment in a sharedfacility would be a high leverage opportunity.
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Finding: The NASA COTS program achieved remarkable success in developing newcommercially competitive space transportation capabilities at significantly less cost to thegovernment and with an accelerated schedule using a payment-for-milestones public-private
partnership.
Finding: While the NASA COTS model holds promise, in general the TRL for spacetransportation systems is substantially higher than the TRL for major fusion energy systems. Dueto the strategic importance of crew and cargo space transportation capabilities to theInternational Space Station and beyond low Earth orbit, NASA pursued a conventional
technology development program (now called Artemis) in parallel with its COTS program tomitigate the commercial investment risk and to serve longer term deep space exploration
goals.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should evaluate and identify the best model
for public-private partnerships to accelerate development and reduce government cost for afusion pilot plant. Note that the different phases of the development, including conceptual
design and technology roadmap, detailed engineering design, construction and operation,
may involve different or incremental public private partnership models, including fixedprice payment for milestones.
ITER CONTRIBUTIONS TO A PILOT PLANT
As an ITER member, the United States receives access to all ITER intellectual property (IP); theDepartment of Energy is responsible for determining how that IP will be available. ITER-related
technologies are accessible to the U.S. fusion industry through partnerships with DOE national
laboratories and universities. U.S. fusion and related industries benefit from the technologies, know-how,and experience that results from U.S. engagement in ITER. Leveraging the experience gained from the
ITER project will be important to meeting the aggressive time scale for a pilot plant.
The United States is responsible for hardware design and manufacturing for 12 different ITER
systems. Experience in developing specifications for ITER hardware procurements and overseeing thedesign, fabrication, and delivery of the hardware that meets regulatory requirements is an important
foundational step that will benefit the design and deployment of a fusion pilot plant. While a pilot plant
will differ considerably from ITER, and may not even be a tokamak configuration, much of theexperience gained through the ITER process is relevant to a pilot plant regardless of its configuration. The
ITER systems that the United States is responsible for that could fit into this category include
instrumentation and control, magnet conductors, steady-state electrical networks, plasma diagnostics,
isotope separation, and vacuum systems. If the U.S. fusion pilot plant is a tokamak, then there are several
specialized systems from the U.S. ITER effort that could be relevant, including the disruption mitigation
system, which limits damage to internal components from off-normal events, high-efficiency radio
frequency power transmission lines for heating systems, and the central solenoid, which produces most of
the plasma current needed in a tokamak. In addition, the United States is contributing to the design ofboth the tokamak blanket/shield and the edge localized modes which support vertical stabilization of theplasma.
Examples of how ITER activities benefit the U.S. fusion industry broadly include:•

Tools and strategies for plasma control and performance. ITER, in conjunction with theinternational community, has led to advances in modeling, prediction, avoidance and controlof plasma transients and disruptions in tokamaks; supporting technologies and techniques
have also been developed. Non-tokamak fusion devices can also benefit from the improved
understanding of plasma behavior derived from ITER R&D.

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•

•

•
•

•
•

•

•

Superconducting magnet technologies. The accumulated mechanical properties of structural
materials at cryogenic operating temperatures is an important asset for all magnet designs. In
addition, lessons learned on the complexity and scale of ITER magnet systems can inform
solutions for feedthroughs and joints and production/testing strategies, even if new
superconductors are likely to be used in the pilot plant.
Radiation transport analysis. Higher resolution and faster radiation computational analysis
tools have been applied to understanding ITER shielding and safety requirements, including
shutdown dose rates. These tools, combined with advanced modeling and simulation, will behighly relevant to the design qualification, and safe operation of future fusion devices andpower plants
High-powered plasma heating. State-of-the-art heating and current drive technologies
developed in the United States and by ITER partners for a nuclear facility could be broadly
applied across many magnetic confinement configurations.
D-T fuel cycle technologies. The knowledge and application of the ITER tritium plant design
directly supports the development of a fusion pilot plant in that the processing rate ofhydrogen isotopes is much greater than current facilities use and scale-up as well as
validation of many components will be completed as part of constructing the ITER fuel cycle.
The ITER design includes ash and impurity removal; recapture of the hydrogen; separation of
the hydrogen isotopes; and the recycling of the isotopes back into the fuel stream. Specifictechnologies to be developed by ITER include: palladium-silver permeators; tritium impurity
catalysis and removal; cryo-pumping of tritium; tritium storage and delivery; and advanced
tritium process modeling. In addition to the fuel process loop, the ITER design includes a
detritiation system that minimizes tritium releases to the environment. Progress has been
made on many fronts in development of these systems for ITER, but challenges remain incomponent scale-up and system integration.
Continuous plasma fueling. ITER has led the development of continuous pellet fuelingsystems for long pulse operations. Pellet fueling may be an effective strategy for efficiently
and reliably delivering hydrogen fuels to plasmas in various device configurations.
Fusion materials. ITER-scale requirements drove a demonstration path for the development
and selection of appropriate plasma-facing and divertor materials that can handle theneutrons, magnetic fields, and heat flux of the ITER fusion environment. Even though theenvironment of a pilot is expected to be harsher (high power density, neutron fluence,different coolants, and higher operating temperature) this is foundational work for next
generation fusion materials and components.
Fusion power and particle handling. ITER power levels and pulse length will exceed that ofany current fusion device. The power and particle handling demands of many fusion pilot
plant designs will require full steady state operation solutions informed by ITER R&D. This
includes actively cooled internal components and high-speed tritium compatible vacuum
pumps.
Burning plasma science. ITER’s mission is to achieve plasma energy gain of 10 and accessthe burning plasma regime. This has two impacts on a fusion pilot plant. The first impact isthrough the development of the detailed science tools needed to predict ITER’s performance.
These tools can be applied to a fusion pilot plant, with the impact being dependent on thepilot’s configuration. These tools can be effective immediately. The second impact would be
anticipated by the experimental achievement of the burning plasma regime after 2035 when
D-T operations are expected to start in ITER. The insights gained from these results could be
important to the fusion pilot plant starting operations at a similar time.

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ITER represents a major step forward in fusion science and technology funded by the U.S.
government through the ITER agreement. The knowledge gained by participating in the ITER project is
one of the key motivations for the United States to continue its support.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should assure maximum possible access to
ITER information for the members of the fusion pilot plant design teams.
INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATIONSThe United States has had major international collaborations in fusion research in addition to
ITER since the fusion program was declassified in 1958. U.S. scientists participate in experiments on
major facilities throughout the world and in particular on the largest cutting edge facilities including
Asdex Upgrade and W7-X in Germany, EAST in China, JET and MAST-U in the United Kingdom, KSTAR in Korea, LHD and JT60-SA in Japan, and WEST in France and many other smaller facilities
around the world. International scientists participate extensively in U.S. experiments. Collaborations spana broad range of topics including not only experiments but also theory, modeling and technology
development. The United States provides neutron irradiation facilities for collaboration with Japanese andEuropean fusion programs. Construction of a pilot plant in the United States would provide an
opportunity to expand these collaborations. In some technology areas, international collaborators would
be able to provide experience and access to test facilities, which are not available in the United States.
This can be mutually beneficial.
NOTES
1. “A Community Plan for Fusion Energy and Discovery Science” can be found at:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w0TKL_Jn0tKUBgUc8RC1s5fIOViH5pRK/view.
2. Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee Report on “Transformative Enabling
Capabilities for Efficient Advance Toward Fusion Energy” https://science.osti.gov//media/fes/fesac/pdf/2018/TEC_Report_15Feb2018.pdf?la=en&hash=A748443D03AD591E340AD046D
53F86537B37FAB0.
3. S.J. Zinkle and J.T. Busby, “Structural materials for fission & fusion energy”, Materials
Today 12 (2009) 12-19.
4. S.J. Zinkle and G.S. Was, “Materials Challenges in Nuclear Energy”, Acta Materialia 61(2013) 735-758.
5. S.J. Zinkle and L.L. Snead, “Designing Radiation Resistance in Materials for Fusion
Energy”, Annual Review of Materials Research 44 (2014) 241-267.
6. R.J. Kurtz and G.R. Odette, “Overview of Reactor Systems and Operating Environments for
Structural Materials in Fusion Reactors”, Structural Alloys for Nuclear Energy Systems, Elsevier 2019,
51-102.
7. S.J. Zinkle and L.L. Snead, “Designing Radiation Resistance in Materials for Fusion
Energy”, Annual Review of Materials Research 44 (2014) 241-267.
8. A. C. Klein, 2017 American Nuclear Society special report.
9. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2019. Final Report of theCommittee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research. Washington, DC: The National
Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25331.
10. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2019. Final Report of theCommittee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research. Washington, DC: The National
Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/25331.
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

11. R.J. Goldston, Heuristic drift-based model of the power scrape-off width in low-gas-puff Hmode tokamaks, Nucl. Fusion 52 (2012) 013009.
12. T. Eich, et al., Inter-ELM Power Decay Length for JET and ASDEX Upgrade: Measurement
and Comparison with Heuristic Drift-Based Model, Phys. Rev. Lett. 107 (2011) 215001.
13. P.B. Snyder, et al., A first-principles predictive model of the pedestal height and width:development, testing and ITER optimization with the EPED model, Nucl. Fusion 51 (2011) 103016.
14. T.E. Evans, et al., Suppression of large edge localized modes with edge resonant magnetic
fields in high confinement DIII-D plasmas, Nucl. Fusion 45 (2005) 595.
15. D.D. Ryutov, Geometrical properties of a “snowflake” divertor, Phys. Plasmas 14 (2007)
064502.
16. M. Kotschenreouther, et al., The super X divertor (SXD) and a compact fusion neutron
source (CFNS), Nucl. Fusion 50(20101)035003.
17. H.Y. Guo, et al., Small angle slot divertor concept for long pulse advanced tokamak, Nucl.
Fusion 57 (2017) 044001.
18. J.E. Menard, et al., Fusion nuclear science facilities and pilot plants based on the sphericaltokamak, Nucl. Fusion 56 (2016)106023.
19. H.Y. Guo et al, First experimental tests of a new small angle slot divertor on DIII-D, Nucl.
Fusion 59 (2019) 086054.
20. See DOE FESAC Report on Transformative Enabling Technologies (2018).
21. D. Larbalestier, Nature, vol. 414 (2001) 368
22. W.H. Feitz, Fusion Engineering & Design, vol. 88 (2013) 440.
23. S.J. Zinkle and L.L. Snead, “Designing Radiation Resistance in Materials for Fusion
Energy”, Annual Review of Materials Research 44 (2014) 241-267.
24. Y. Dai, G.R. Odette and T. Yamamoto, “The Effects of Helium in Irradiated Structural
Alloys”, in Comprehensive Nuclear Materials (2012), R.J.M. Konings, editor, Elsevier, 141-193.
25. R.J. Kurtz and G.R. Odette, “Overview of Reactor Systems and Operating Environments for
Structural Materials in Fusion Reactors”, Structural Alloys for Nuclear Energy Systems, Elsevier 2019,
51-102.
26. Y. Dai, G.R. Odette and T. Yamamoto, “The Effects of Helium in Irradiated Structural
Alloys”, in Comprehensive Nuclear Materials (2012), R.J.M. Konings, editor, Elsevier, 141-193.
27. Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee Report on “Transformative Enabling
Capabilities for Efficient Advance Toward Fusion Energy” https://science.osti.gov//media/fes/fesac/pdf/2018/TEC_Report_15Feb2018.pdf?la=en&hash=A748443D03AD591E340AD046D
53F86537B37FAB0.
28. Steve L. Robbins, What If, 11th Anniversary Edition, 2018.
29. “A Community Plan for Fusion Energy and Discovery Science” can be found at:https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w0TKL_Jn0tKUBgUc8RC1s5fIOViH5pRK/view.
30. Promising Practices for Addressing the Underrepresentation of Women in Science,
Engineering, and Medicine: Opening Doors, edited by Rita Colwell, Ashley Bear, and Alex Helman, The
National Academies Press, 2020.
31. Expanding Underrepresented Minority Participation, The National Academies Press, 2011.
32. “Investments in privately funded fusion ventures grow” Physics Today, October 13, 2020,
DOI:10.1063/PT.6.2.20201013a.
33. “In Search of a SpaceX For Nuclear Energy,” Nuclear Innovation Alliance, May 2019.
https://www.nuclearinnovationalliance.org/search-spacex-nuclear-energy.
34. Cost-Sharing Partnerships With the Private Sector in Fusion Energy, Federal Register,
4/20/2020. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2020/04/20/2020-08312/cost-sharingpartnerships-with-the-private-sector-in-fusion-energy.
35. https://www.energy.gov/ne/nuclear-reactor-technologies/advanced-reactor-demonstrationprogram.
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5
Strategy and Roadmap for a Pilot Plant
In response to the statement of task, the committee took the feedback from the utilities into
account which framed the timeline requirements for the pilot plant. As noted above, the electrical utilities
in the United States are working toward the transition to low-carbon emission electricity production by
2050. This motivates exploring a schedule to bring a pilot plant into operation between 2035 and 2040:
this is aggressive relative to recent construction of large fusion facilities and other countries’ fusion
program plans, with the exception of China’s CFETR program and the United Kingdom recently
announced STEP program. Both programs seek to be the first to put electricity on the grid. Unlike theprogram plans developed by the Community Planning Process (CPP), 1 which considered acomprehensive bottom-up approach that is appropriate to developing a program and includes many
elements beyond those associated with a pilot plant, this has taken a more targeted approach to explore
what would be needed to bring a pilot plant into operation as soon as possible for fusion to be considered
as a viable generation alternative during the investment window. This schedule driven approach will
require the execution of many parallel activities and engagement of a broad group of participants in theprivate and public sector as discussed in Chapter 4. In parallel with the development of this report,
FESAC is addressing the schedule implications and priorities of the Community Planning Process report.
Ultimately, it will be necessary to reconcile the upcoming FESAC report and its priorities with the topdown schedule driven approach described herein.
In the 2019 report Final Report of the Committee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma
Research (hereafter the “Burning Plasma report”), 2 the tokamak concept was identified as the primary
track to a fusion pilot plant and the stellarator as the leading alternative. The statement of task for thisreport does not presume which fusion concept to pursue for a pilot plant and this committee did notevaluate different concepts. Since both technical performance and economic attractiveness are major
considerations for a pilot plant, a parallel approach in the development of more than one fusion concept,
at least to the preliminary design level, is appropriate. A key element in the successful COTS program
was the competition between companies. That spirit of competition to develop the most viable pilot plant
is appropriate. While specifying the precise number of pilot plant teams is premature, two to four design
teams can be envisioned to encourage competition.
Conclusion: To meet the challenge of operating a pilot plant between 2035 and 2040, thedevelopment of fusion concepts, technology, and pilot plant designs will need to be performed inparallel.
Such an approach enables schedule acceleration and is needed for fusion to be ready as a possible
generation alternative as the mix in the U.S. transition to low-carbon emission. Parallel development,
however, includes inherent risk where some lines of research may not be successful and additional
resources will be needed to accomplish multiple lines of activity at the same time as compared tocompleting activities sequentially. Using the 2019 Burning Plasma report as an example, additional
resources will be required for the pilot plant and to complete the necessary research and development
identified in that report.
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Six phases have been identified in the development and operation of a fusion pilot plant: (1)conceptual and preliminary design, (2) final design and construction, (3) start of operation, (4) first phaseof operation, (5) second phase of operation, and (6) third phase of operation to take advantage of thisunique facility. The scope of these phases is described below. The accompanying timeline illustrates
when the various phases need to be implemented to commission a pilot plant into operation sometime
between 2035-2040. Detailed planning and resource allocation would be required to develop a moreaccurate timeline. A timeline with the major elements is shown in Figure 5.1.

FIGURE 5.1 The phases of operation are illustrated. Chapter 3 defines the key technical goals for thephases in detail. The major goals are shown here and described below.

PRIOR TO START OF CONSTRUCTION:
CONCEPTUAL AND PRELIMINARY DESIGN (2021-2028)
The highly integrated nature of a pilot plant requires that both scientific and technical issues arecomprehensively addressed. The goal of a lower cost pilot plant relies on innovations in science andtechnology. These must be performed and extensively evaluated prior to finalizing the design andinitiating construction.
While substantial progress has occurred in achieving plasma parameters that may extrapolate tothat needed for a pilot plant, outstanding technical issues remain for even the most mature fusion
concepts. As discussed in the CPP report, the remaining gaps, which are significant, must be addressed tohave confidence in the performance of a pilot plant.
Conclusion: Each successful pilot plant fusion concept must demonstrate that the requisite
Lawson parameter to extrapolate fusion plasma gain, particle and energy confinement time, heatexhaust, stability, energetic particle confinement and sustainment, can be achieved with small
extrapolation to the parameters needed for a pilot plant to provide confidence in the performanceof the pilot plant.
The physics parameters required for evaluating a fusion concept for a pilot plant are broadly
discussed in Chapters 3 and 4. The parameters depend in detail on the fusion concept under consideration.
These will need to be defined early in this phase to ensure that the experimental and theoretical program
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridsupports the timely evaluation of the concept and must be made prior to making the decision to start
construction.
As noted in the CPP report and discussed further in Chapter 4, many technological issues are at alow TRL level and the maturity of many of the technologies required for the pilot plant needs to increase.
Furthermore, to improve the economic attractiveness, there is also a need for technological innovations.
This was also highlighted in the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee Report on Transformative
Enabling Capabilities for Efficient Advance Toward Fusion Energy, 3 which identified opportunities fortechnological innovation. Some of these are already being pursued by the fusion industry as well as byuniversities and national laboratories.
Conclusion: Critical technologies such as large bore high temperature superconducting magnets,
blanket concepts, functional materials, plasma facing materials, tritium processing including
development of low inventory systems have to increase the TRL to 6 or 7 to minimize the scale
up to a pilot plant.
While the development of some technologies will facilitate many different fusion concepts, somefusion concepts require specific technologies to meet the goals identified in Chapter 3. It is necessary toincrease the maturity of critical technologies that have the largest impact on many different concepts
while recognizing that the list of critical technologies may evolve as the design of the pilot plant evolves
for example through the conceptual design phase or breakthrough developments occur. To illustrate this,most fusion concepts rely on deuterium-tritium (D-T) fuel and development of blanket concepts to breed
tritium and process tritium as described in Chapter 4 is needed. The use of hydrogen and boron, pure
deuterium, or deuterium and helium-3 as the fuel would not require tritium breeding; however, a
breakthrough in the plasma confinement and temperature is required and other technologies would haveto be developed.
The regulatory framework required to obtain a construction and operations license is very
important to develop an understanding of the cost and schedule for the pilot plant and eventually a firstof-a-kind (FOAK) power plant. This is discussed in more detail in Chapter 3.
Conclusion: The regulatory framework for fusion should be well defined based on a risk-based
approach appropriate to fusion.
The site of a pilot plant has important practical ramifications including public acceptance that canaffect the cost and schedule as discussed in Chapter 3.
Conclusion: Site requirements and possible options for site selection will need to be identified.
A fusion pilot plant entails the integration of scientific, engineering and regulatory issues andrequires a broad spectrum of skills.
Finding: Due to the highly integrated aspects of a pilot plant, national well-coordinated teams
composed of developers, manufacturers, EPC, universities, and national labs are needed todevelop pilot plant concepts to ensure a robust engineering design and a reliable cost andschedule.
Recommendation: The Department of Energy should move forward now to foster thecreation of national teams, including public-private partnerships, that will develop
conceptual pilot plant designs and technology roadmaps and lead to an engineering designof a pilot plant that will bring fusion to commercial viability.

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Without a design and the resolution of the remaining scientific and technical issues, it is notpossible to reliably project the cost of the pilot plant at this time. However, in light of the eventual
marketplace for a power plant, the cost of building a pilot plant is an important consideration as well as
the projected cost of electricity for a power plant.
Conclusion: If the pilot plant cannot be built for less than the projected cost of the FOAK power
plant or the concept does not have the potential for producing electricity at an economicallycompetitive cost, then further innovations will be required to reduce the cost and improve theconcept prior to proceeding to construction.
A distinguishing feature of a pilot plant relative to a research project is that not only does it haveto meet scientific and engineering objectives but also provide a cost basis for a FOAK power plant. Thus,
the cost of the facility in relation to other projects generating electricity is an important consideration as
well as the implications for producing electricity. Delays in meeting this goal would result in decreased
opportunities for impacting the U.S. marketplace during the transition to low-carbon emission. On alonger timeline, opportunities to replace the fleet of generating equipment with fusion power plants would
exist as well as potentially addressing the needs of the international marketplace due to the expected needfor increased low-carbon and non-carbon emission electricity generation as discussed in Chapter 2. This
longer timeline was not explored by the committee but would have ramifications for private investors.
PRIOR TO START OF OPERATION OF A PILOT PLANT:FINAL DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION (2028-2032)
The success of this phase will rely on the effectiveness of the integrated national team, which isassumed to continue into this phase. During this phase detailed engineering final design would becompleted. It is assumed that technical risks were reduced during the preceding phase through theconstruction of prototypes if needed and that this would also be used to qualify vendors.
Conclusion: Design and construction of the pilot plant needs to be completed and integrated
systems testing needs to be performed to commission a facility prior to start of operation of apilot plant.
Conclusion: A construction and operating license will need to be obtained.
In the preceding chapters, the report identified a set of recommendations and conclusions that
imply actions that need to be addressed. These are summarized in Table 5.1 by different phases leading
up to the completion of construction. After the creation of the national teams, design work andtechnology roadmaps would be developed for each concept to provide a more detailed schedule.
Depending on the concept, some elements would receive greater or lesser emphasis. The elements are notorganized in priority order.
START OF OPERATION (2032-2035)
Operations would proceed from non-nuclear operations and demonstrate the resolution ofscientific and technical issues. For facilities using tritium, the tritium fueling systems would becommissioned.

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TABLE 5.1 Various Activities in Support of the Development of a Fusion Pilot Plant
Recommendation
or Innovation
Category

Immediate Action

Completed byConceptual Design

Preliminary Design

Final Design

Organization anddesignCreate national
teams to initiate
design from private
sector, universities
and national labs

Complete concept.
Enhance teams.

Select and consolidateteam(s)Define cost andschedule

Execute Fusion Pilot Plant design andconstruction

Technology
approach

Develop technology
roadmaps

Conceptual design,
Refine technology
roadmaps

Preliminary design.
Critical technology
prototypes
demonstrated.

Final design
completed.

Public-private
partnerships
Data/expertise
accessRegulatory

Develop PPP models
for fusion and techdevelopment
Private sector accessto ITER data
Expand industrial
access to labs anduniversities

Execute PPPs

Plasmaperformance
Actuators

Develop regulatoryneeds / framework

Tritium/fuel cycle

BlanketNeutron material
degradation
Structural design
requirements
Plasma-facing
components
Blackstart

Define Diversity,
Execute DEI
Equity and Inclusion
improvement(DEI) plan
Improve plasma performance andpredictive capability
Define actuator needs

Heat exhaust

Completeconstruction

Refine and expand PPPs

Continued data and expertise sharing from labs/universities into private sector.
Intellectual property agreements.

Site
Workforce

Construction

Define heat exhaustchallenge
Define tritium/fuelcycle requirements.
Design demonstration.
Define blanket andtest facility
requirements. Design
blanket test facility.
Design limited volume
neutron source
Develop hightemperature structuraldesign requirements
Define PFC
requirements
Evaluate blackstartcapability

Finalize regulatory
framework
Develop siterequirements andoptions

Obtain required licenses
Develop site

Workforce growth consistent with DEI plan
Demonstrateequivalent Qp>1
Develop actuator
technology
Demonstrate heatexhaust solutions
Demonstrate
tritium/fuel cycle
process technology

Evolve and improve projections to Qp > 1,
Qe > 1 and required availability
Design and deploy actuators
Implement solutions
Demonstrateefficient tritium/fuelcycle processing

Operate blanket test
facility. Obtain data.

Finalize design and build 1st generation

Operate neutron
source, obtain initial
results

Acquire further data,
confirm material and design

Obtain requisite data

Implement requirements

Design and test PFCs

Fabricate and install PFC

NOTE: Summaries of recommendations and conclusions of this report are highlighted in red.

FIRST PHASE OF PILOT PLANT OPERATION (COMPLETED BY 2035-2040)
Operations would proceed from non-nuclear operations to the use of the fuel mix that will be usedin the FOAK power plant and demonstrate fusion power production. For fusion concepts that will use DT fuel, demonstrate the performance of the tritium fuel system and evaluate tritium breeding and project
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tritium breeding performance to the Second Phase. A more extensive definition of the goals for the firstand second phase of the pilot plant is given in Chapter 3.
Conclusion: Sufficient fusion plasma energy gain (Qp) will need to be demonstrated to show thatnet electricity is feasible (Phase 1a).
Conclusion: A peak ≥50 MWe net electricity production for ≥3 hours with Qe > 1 (Phase 1b)
should be targeted.
Conclusion: Safe and environmentally acceptable operation consistent with the operating license
will need to be demonstrated.
SECOND PHASE OF PILOT PLANT OPERATION (COMPLETED BY 2040-2045)
The purpose of this phase is to resolve the scientific and technical issues and enable the fusion
industry developers and power plant owners and operators to evaluate both the cost of a FOAK power
plant as well as project the cost of producing electricity. In addition to producing net electricity with highavailability, the pilot plant would demonstrate ability to maintain and replace in-vessel and blanket
components, tritium breeding to be >0.9 for concept using D-T and have sufficient data to project theperformance of a FOAK, and test materials to 2-3 MW-year m −2. The availability of the plant during thisphase should exceed 50% and be sufficient to enable projection of the availability and reliability of a
FOAK reactor. During this phase, tritium breeding should be demonstrated to be sufficient for a FOAK
reactor.
Conclusion: The second phase of a pilot plant should demonstrate peak 50-100 MWe net
electricity production and average net electricity generated for at least one environmental cycle,
which includes the outage to perform maintenance and replacement of in-vessel components.
THIRD PHASE OF PILOT PLANT OPERATION
The pilot plant may be a viable test bed for materials testing and exploring new technologies tofurther improve the concept. While the second phase of operation will enable evaluation of structural
materials to 2-3 MW-year m−2, the materials may perform beyond that level and qualification of materials
can be performed in the pilot plant. Furthermore, other more advanced materials can be tested. This also
can be a test bed for alternative blanket designs or coolant systems. The scope of this operating phaserequires careful consideration. There is clearly a unique capability that can be exploited; however, thismay entail making the pilot plant design more flexible and incorporating this capability at the front end.
In general, this complicates the design, increases capital cost for construction and results in longer
construction duration schedules.
Conclusion: The full scope of the third phase should be evaluated as part of the preliminary
design effort.
STRATEGIC RISKS AND OPPORTUNITIESThe schedule noted in this plan has both opportunities and risks associated with it. The
opportunities include engagement by a recently emerged and growing private industry. As noted earlier,private industry brings both financial resources and a market focus. If anything, their market focus
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involves an even more accelerated timeline. The schedule provides an opportunity to contribute tosupporting the transition to a low-carbon emission electrical marketplace. Due to the level oftechnological readiness, there are risks in meeting this schedule. They are addressed by identifying the
key technical goals and will require resources to tackle them. This ambitious plan requires theperformance of research and development in parallel with design. This encourages synergy between thedesign and research and development effort; however, it does introduce risk that the design will have to
be modified or even discarded. A key element in the plan is that each concept design activity develops atechnology roadmap to address the critical development requirements. While the recent 2020 CPP and
FESAC reports have identified the broad issues, this will provide a greater level of detail and focus on theadvances required for each particular conceptual design strategy. There is also a risk that some of theresearch development effort will identify that the key goals either cannot be met or result in significant
schedule delay; this should not be considered a failure but the result of a healthy, diverse approach to adifficult, integrated design. This issue is addressed by a critical decision point prior to proceeding withconstruction. While the indicated timeline for the design and construction of pilot plant is less than thatof constructing JT-60SA, W7-X and ITER, it is worth noting that it is longer than for JET and
TFTR. The design effort including prototypes of key components will be critical to develop theconstruction and assembly schedule.
The duration of the operating phase prior to fusion power performance is short relative to what
JET and TFTR needed to develop new plasma operating scenarios and commission the tritium and remotehandling systems. In this plan, the plasma operating scenario will be demonstrated in experiments that
operate with equivalent fusion gains greater than unity prior to the decision to construct. This experience
will be invaluable to the pilot plant. Of course, new technologies such as the tritium breeding blankets on
the pilot plant will have to be tested and developed but the prior development on test stands will increase
the likelihood of their performance. Since a volumetric neutron source may not be available in time tofully qualify neutron degradation in structural and functional materials, phase 3 pilot plant operation
would fulfill this and assess component lifetime. All risks can never be fully mitigated; however, themajor technological issues have been identified in this report.
There are risks and opportunities associated with changes in the timeline for the transition to a
low-carbon emission electrical marketplace. Due to climate change considerations, the transition may
accelerate. This will make it more difficult for fusion to contribute. This motivated, in part, therecommendation for the fusion program increasing its engagement with the energy community. Due toother political or technological considerations, the transition may be delayed. This may be an opportunity
for fusion to make a greater contribution if the proposed timeline is followed.
The risks associated with the proposed timeline were considered in the context of the risks ofextending the timeline to a pilot plant. The following are some ramifications of an extended timeline oreven elimination of the timeline. First and foremost, the transition to low-carbon emission electricity
generation is underway. The electrical utilities will use whatever combination of technologies areavailable to make the transition. Without firm low-carbon and non-carbon emission electricity
generators, the price will increase. Fusion has the potential to contribute to addressing this. Since power
plants typically operate for 40 years or more, a delayed timeline will diminish opportunities for fusion toenter the marketplace. By entering the marketplace, it will be possible to refine and improve fusioncommercial power plants. Without entering the marketplace, that process of innovation will behampered. Second, a schedule that does not address the needs of the marketplace or is very long-term
will discourage private investment and retention of expertise in U.S. industry. Third, China and theUnited Kingdom are embarking on development to be the first to put fusion on the grid. The U. S. hasplayed a major role in the development of the fundamental science underlying fusion and has theopportunity to build on its past accomplishments or it can let other countries take the lead on thistechnology.
The committee acknowledges there are risks and opportunities with the proposed timeline, whichwere considered in the context of an extended timeline. In addition to the scientific risks of generating
fusion power for extended durations and the technical risks of advanced materials and engineering
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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Gridsystems to close the fuel cycle in a concept that is cost effective, a major risk is whether the timely
resources required from the public and private investors to move forward will become available.
SUMMARY
In response to the statement of task, the committee has in Chapter 2 identified the key
requirements for fusion to support the transition to a low-carbon emission electrical marketplace by 2050.
A pilot plant is a necessary step in the development of fusion energy. This report identifies the technicaland economic considerations that need to be addressed for fusion to make an impact on the marketplace.
The key marketplace requirements combined with the previous technical studies provided a basis
for identifying the key goals for fusion in Chapter 3. This was a broad perspective ranging fromdemonstrating scientific and technical feasibility to defining the performance goals for a fusion pilot
plant. In support of the key goals in Chapter 3, the scientific and technical innovations required to bothdemonstrate feasibility and address the cost requirements of the marketplace were presented in Chapter 4.
Fusion development will require participation by industry, including companies developing fusionenergy, building components and providing EPC services, national laboratories, and universities bringing
together a broad range of skills. A key element in Chapter 4 is the role of public-private partnerships topotentially accelerate the development of fusion and to ensure a transition to the marketplace. In thischapter, an accelerated timeline to build and operate a pilot plant to enable fusion to support the transitionin the electrical marketplace is presented.
Conclusion: Successful operation of a pilot plant in the 2035-2040 timeframe requires urgent
investments by DOE and private industry—both to resolve the remaining technical and scientificissues and to design, construct, and commission a pilot plant.
NOTES
1. American Physical Society, 2020, A Community Plan for Fusion Energy and Discovery
Science: Report of the 2019-2020 American Physical Society Division of Plasma Physics Community
Planning Process, https://drive.google.com/file/d/1w0TKL_Jn0tKUBgUc8RC1s5fIOViH5pRK/view.
2. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2019. Final Report of theCommittee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research, Washington, DC: The National
Academies Press, https://doi.org/10.17226/25331.
3. U.S. Department of Energy, 2018, Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee Report:
Transformative Enabling Capabilities for Efficient Advance Toward Fusion Energy,
https://science.osti.gov//media/fes/fesac/pdf/2018/TEC_Report_15Feb2018.pdf?la=en&hash=A748443D03AD591E340AD046D
53F86537B37FAB0.

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. Grid

Appendixes

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A
Statement of Task
The committee will be charged with providing guidance to the U.S. Department of Energy, andothers, that are aligned with the objective of constructing a pilot plant in the United States that produces
electricity from fusion at the lowest possible capital cost (“Pilot Plant”). In the study, to be completed
within 8 months of project initiation, the committee shall provide a concise report that addresses thefollowing points:••

In developing and carrying out a plan for building a Pilot Plant, key goals need to beestablished for all critical aspects of the Pilot Plant. Identify those key goals, independent ofconfinement concept, which a Pilot Plant must demonstrate during each of its anticipatedphases of operation.
List the principal innovations needed for the private sector to address, perhaps in concert withefforts by DOE, to meet the key goals identified in the first bullet.
CONSIDERATIONSIn addressing the first bullet in the statement of task, the committee should consider the key goals
for each of the plant’s anticipated phases of operation. Areas for key goals that the committee might
consider include scientific (e.g., materials and systems performance and integration), technical (e.g.,
electrical output and availability), economic (e.g., capital costs and time frame, operating andmaintenance costs), environmental (e.g., level of radioactive wastes), and safety-related (e.g., regulatory,tritium inventory).
In carrying out the statement of task, the committee is encouraged to seek input from potential“future owners” of power plants, such as electric utility companies, and potential manufacturers of fusion
power plant components, to broadly characterize the energy market for fusion and to provide input onwhat they would look for in a fusion pilot plant and how such plants can contribute to national energy
needs.

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B
Biographies of Committee Members
RICHARD J. HAWRYLUK, Chair, is associate director for fusion at the Princeton Plasma Physics
Laboratory. Among other responsibilities, he was interim deputy director for operations from October
2018 to January 2019 and interim project director of the NSTX-U Recovery Project from March 2018 to
July 2019. From August 2017 to July 2018, he was interim director of the Princeton Plasma Physics
Laboratory. Dr. Hawryluk came to the lab in 1974 after receiving a Ph.D. in physics from the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He headed the Tokamak Fusion Test Reactor at PPPL, thenthe largest magnetic confinement fusion facility in the United States, from 1991 to 1997, and led thedeuterium-tritium experiments. Hawryluk oversaw all research and technical operations as deputy directorof the laboratory from 1997 to 2008. He then spent several years working on research and management
topics associated with ITER, as head of the ITER and Tokamaks Department from 2009 to 2011 and from2013 to 2016, and as deputy director general for the Administration Department of ITER from 2011 to
2013. He also chairs the board of editors of Nuclear Fusion, a monthly journal devoted to controlled
fusion energy. He has chaired and participated in numerous national and international program reviews
and advisory committees.
BRENDA L. GARCIA-DIAZ is the manager for the Energy Materials Group at Savannah River National
Laboratories (SRNL). She leads a strategic initiative project to develop electrochemical fluorination forused nuclear fuel reprocessing and was recently the program manager on nuclear material storage
programs looking at corrosion and degradation in nuclear material storage containers before her current
position at SRNL. Prior to that, Dr. Garcia-Diaz was a co-founder and CEO of Greenway Energy, acompany focused on Clean Energy Research that has received multiple commercial and Department ofEnergy (DOE)-funded projects. A Puerto Rico native, she received her master’s degree in chemicalengineering from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez, and Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the
University of South Carolina. Dr. Garcia-Diaz is the co-author on over 10 patent disclosures andapplications.
GERALD L. KULCINSKI is the Grainger Professor of Nuclear Engineering (emeritus) at the Universityof Wisconsin, Madison, where he was the director of the Fusion Technology Institute from 1974-2018.
Dr. Kulcinski was the associate dean of research for the College of Engineering from 2001 to 2014. He
was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 1993 and was awarded the NASA Public Service
Medal in 1993 and the NASA Exceptional Public Service Medal in 2010. He served on the NASA
Advisory Council from 2005 to 2009 and on the Advisory Committee for the Department of Commerceon Emerging Technology from 2008-2018. He has been a fellow in the American Nuclear Society (ANS)
since 1978. He has served as a chair, co-chair, or member of six study committees.
KATHRYN A. MCCARTHY is the associate laboratory director for Fusion and Fission Energy and
Science at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. From January 2017 to February 2020, Dr. McCarthy was vicepresident of research and development and laboratory director at the Canadian Nuclear Laboratories. She
was the national technical director for systems analysis for the DOE-NE Fuel Cycle R&D Program,
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preceded by involvement in various other nuclear fission and fusion programs. Dr. McCarthy was a guest
scientist at the Kernforschungszentrum in Germany, March-September 1989, and participated in the DOE
U.S./U.S.S.R. Young Scientist Program at the Efremov and Kurchatov Institutes in Russia, and theLatvian Academy of Science in Latvia, September 1989-August 1990. Her awards include an American
Nuclear Society Presidential citation in 2015 for “Leadership and guidance of the Light Water Reactor
Sustainability effort….that has helped set the stage for U.S. power companies to be able to makeinformed decisions regarding subsequent license renewal for their operating nuclear units,” and in 2007
for “outstanding service to the ANS,” the 2000 ANS Women’s Achievement Award, 1996 International
Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor U.S. Home Team Leadership Award, and the 1994 David RoseAward for Excellence in Fusion Engineering. She received her B.S. in nuclear engineering at the
University of Arizona; M.S and Ph.D. in nuclear engineering at UCLA. She is a member of the National
Academy of Engineering and served on the Committee on the Prospects for Inertial Fusion Energy in
2013.
PER F. PETERSON holds the William and Jean McCallum Floyd Chair in the Department of Nuclear
Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also chief nuclear officer for Kairos Power,
where he guides nuclear technology review and advises on scientific and technical topics for KP-FHR
technology development and licensing. At University of California, Berkeley, he performs research
related to high-temperature fission energy systems, as well as studying topics related to fusion energy
technologies and the safety and security of nuclear materials and waste management. He has served as amember or chair of numerous advisory committees for the national laboratories and National Academies.
His research in the 1990s contributed to the development of the passive safety systems used in the GEESBWR and Westinghouse AP-1000 reactor designs. His 2003 Nuclear Technology article with Charles
Forsberg and Paul Pickard identified salt-cooled, solid-fuel reactors as a promising technology, today
called fluoride-salt-cooled, high-temperature reactors (FHRs). His current work and research focuses on
enabling and accelerating advanced nuclear energy technologies.
JEFFREY P. QUINTENZ recently retired from General Atomics (GA) where he was senior VP of theEnergy Group and is now a part-time employee of TechSource, Inc., with the title of senior nuclear
subject matter expert. At GA, Dr. Quintenz led research and development divisions encompassing all GA
activities in magnetic fusion energy, inertial confinement fusion (ICF), and nuclear technologies andmaterials (fission). His research interests include fusion (both inertial and magnetic confinement), nuclear
power, and nuclear weapons deterrence. Previously Dr. Quintenz was director of pulsed power sciences
and ICF program manager at Sandia National Laboratories. After joining Sandia, he developed andapplied computational tools to the study of plasmas and particle beams. He has also served as director of
the ICF Office within NNSA, and president of Lockheed Martin Nevada Technologies with responsibility
for the stockpile stewardship program activities at the Nevada Test Site. He is a fellow of the IEEE andrecipient of the NNSA Excellence Medal. He earned his Ph.D. in electrical engineering from the
University of Arizona. He is currently a member of the Defense Programs Advisory Committee (DPAC)
serving the senior leadership in the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA).
WANDA K. REDER is currently the president and CEO if Grid-X Partners based in Chicago. Prior tothat, she was the chief strategy officer at S&C Electric Company. Her pioneering work has led to smart
grid deployments and wind, solar energy, and utility-scale battery storage integration into traditional
utility systems. An IEEE Fellow, Dr. Reder was recognized with the 2014 IEEE Richard M. Emerson
Award for her leadership in the IEEE Smart Grid program and in the continued growth of the Power andEnergy Society (PES), including the creation of its Scholarship Fund program. She was the first woman
president of PES and is responsible for the launch of the IEEE Smart Grid, positioning IEEE as theleading source for information on smart-grid technology. Dr. Reder is a member of DOE’s Electricity
Advisory Committee. She is also a member of the National Academy of Engineering and a candidate for2017 IEEE President-Elect.
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DAVID W. ROOP is the principle consultant at DWR Associates. He has a 43-year career in the electricutility industry focused on electric transmission and substation operations and management. He
previously chaired Dominion Energy Virginia’s resiliency strategy team resulting in industry leading
initiatives. These initiatives include the development and implementation of large power transformers
hardened against geomagnetically induced currents (GIC), implementation of substation security
initiatives, electromagnetic pulse (EMP) hardening of substations, and the development of transmission
mobile equipment such as Static Synchronous Compensators (STATCOMs). In addition, Mr. Roop has
managed the rapid deployment of eight Flexible AC Transmission Systems (FACTS)” across Dominion
Energy Virginia’s system which includes Static Var Compensators (SVCs) and Static SynchronousCompensators (STATCOMs). His duties included technical support and engineering resources forelectrical equipment, protective relays and operations including research activities to support
Transmission System development. His organization also provided technical support for Dominion
Generation substations, including protective relaying, for both regulated and merchant plants. He holds
one patent for grounding of electrical systems. Currently, he is a registered professional engineer in the
Commonwealth of Virginia and is an active member of CIGRE presently serving as president of the
CIGRE U.S. National Committee. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2018 andcurrently serves on the board of directors of the Virginia Academy of Science, Engineering, and Medicine(VASEM). Mr. Roop is a life member of the IEEE and member of Eta Kappa Nu. Mr. Roop is also an
adjunct professor of practice at Virginia Tech in the Bradley Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering.
PHILIP SNYDER is director of the Theory and Computational Science Department at General Atomics
in San Diego, California. He received a B.S. in computational physics from Yale University (1993), and a
Ph.D. in plasma physics from Princeton University (1999) before joining the fusion theory group atGeneral Atomics. His research has focused on electromagnetic plasma turbulence, and on the stability anddynamics of the edge region of magnetic fusion plasmas, particularly the physics of the edge transportbarrier (“pedestal”) and edge localized modes (ELMs). He developed a predictive model of the pedestal,
which has been coupled to models of the core plasma to predict and optimize performance of existing andfuture fusion devices. He serves as principal investigator for the Theory and Simulation of Fusion
Plasmas, and the Edge Simulation Laboratory projects. He is a fellow of the APS (2010), and a recipientof the APS John Dawson Award for Excellence in Plasma Physics Research (2013), and the International
Atomic Energy Agency Nuclear Fusion Prize (2014). He served as a member of the National Academies
Committee on a Strategic Plan for U.S. Burning Plasma Research.
JENNIFER L. UHLE is NEI’s vice president of generation and suppliers. Prior to joining NEI, Dr. Uhle
served as the director of reactor safety programs at Jensen Hughes, a consulting company to the nuclear
industry. Dr. Uhle joined Jensen Hughes in 2016, working in advanced reactors, thermal-hydraulics andregulatory affairs. Previously, she served at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for 23 years inseveral positions including the deputy director of the offices of Nuclear Regulatory Research and Nuclear
Reactor Regulation and the director of the Office of New Reactors. Dr. Uhle obtained her bachelor’s anddoctorate degrees in nuclear engineering from MIT in 1991 and 1996, respectively, with a specializationin reactor systems and design. She served as the U.S. representative to the International Atomic Energy
Agency’s first fact-finding mission to Fukushima in 2011. She serves on the advisory committee to MIT’s
Department of Nuclear Engineering.
DENNIS G. WHYTE is the Hitachi America Professor of Engineering at MIT, a professor in the MIT
Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, and director of the MIT Plasma Science and Fusion
Center. Dr. Whyte’s research interests focus on accelerating the development of magnetic fusion energy
systems. He has led teams and published over 300 papers across the multidisciplinary fields of magnetic
fusion including plasma confinement, plasma-surface interactions, blanket technology, plasma
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diagnostics, superconducting magnets, and ion beam surface analysis. Dr. Whyte leads the overall MIT
research team on SPARC, a private-sector funded compact high-field tokamak presently underdevelopment to demonstrate net fusion plasma energy gain. He also leads the Laboratory for Innovations
in Fusion Technology at PSFC, which has energy company sponsorship to explore early-stage, disruptive
fusion technologies. As an educator, Dr. Whyte has been deeply involved in student design courses forfusion energy systems. He was educated in Canada, gaining his Ph.D. from the U. Quebec working on theTokamak de Varennes, Canada’s national fusion facility. He previously worked at the DIII-D National
Fusion facility for a decade and served as a senior lecturer at UCSD. He was an assistant professor in the
Nuclear Engineering department at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, from 2002-2006. Dr. Whyte
previously served as MIT Nuclear Science and Engineering Department Head. He has served as leader ofthe Boundary-Plasma Interface Topical Group of the U.S. Burning Plasma Organization and is a fellow of
the APS Division of Plasma Physics. He was awarded DOE’s Plasma Physics Junior Faculty Award in
2003. In 2013, he won the IAEA Nuclear Fusion Prize and was presented the Fusion Power Associates
Leadership Award in 2018. He is a two-time winner of the Ruth and Joel Spira Award for Distinguished
Teaching from the School of Engineering at MIT. Dr. Whyte has been a committee member on two
previous National Academies studies: “A Review of the DOE Plan for U.S. Fusion Community
Participation in the ITER Program” (2009) and “An Assessment of the Prospects for Inertial Fusion
Energy” (2013).
BRIAN D. WIRTH is the Governor’s Chair Professor of Computational Nuclear Engineering in the
Department of Nuclear Engineering at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, and Oak Ridge National
Laboratory. Professor Wirth’s research investigates the performance of nuclear fuels, structural materials
and plasma facing components in nuclear environments, utilizing computational materials modelingcomplemented by experimental investigation. Dr. Wirth received a B.S. in nuclear engineering from theGeorgia Institute of Technology in 1992 and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University ofCalifornia, Santa Barbara in 1998. Dr. Wirth spent 4 years in the High Performance Computational
Materials Science Group at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. In 2002 he joined the faculty at the
University of California, Berkeley, as an assistant professor of nuclear engineering and was promoted toassociate professor in 2006. He has received a number of awards, including the 2014 DOE Ernest O.
Lawrence Award in Energy Science and Innovation, the 2016 Mishima Award from the ANS for
outstanding work in nuclear fuels and materials research and the 2003 Presidential Early Career Award
for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). Dr. Wirth is a fellow of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science (AAAS, 2016 Fellow, Physics Section) and the ANS (2017 Fellow).

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Bringing Fusion to the U.S. GridC
Committee Meeting Agendas
MEETING 1
Day 1: August 26, 2020
CLOSED SESSION
11:00 AM
Welcome, Introductions, and Meeting Overview
Introduction s Studies Process, Bias and Conflict Discussion
Committee Composition and Balance Discussion
Discussion: Statement of Task
OPEN PUBLIC SESSION
2:45
Discussion with DOE-FES sponsors- Jim Van Dam, DOE-FES
CLOSED SESSION
4:30
Wrap up discussion, possible outline, and strategy going forward
Day 2: September 2, 2020
CLOSED SESSION
11:00 AM
Recap of previous day
Discussion of the charge to the committee, and end goals
OPEN PUBLIC SESSION
12:00 PM
Discussion with DOE-OS- Chris Fall, DOE-OS
12:30

Discussion with ARPA-E- Scott Hsu, ARPA-E

1:00

Break

1:30

Discussion with Hill staff- Adam Rosenberg, House Science Committee- Hillary O’Brian, House Science Committee

2:00

Discussion of the previous Burning Plasma Report- Mike Mauel, Burning Plasma Report Chair
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CLOSED SESSION
3:00
Roundtable discussion of previous
Discussion of the possible outline
Wrap up discussion
Planning next meetings and assignments
6:00

Adjourn
MEETING 2
Day 1: September 23, 2020

CLOSED SESSION
11:00 AM
Committee Discussion
OPEN PUBLIC SESSION
11:15
Discussion with Panel 1: Licensing
Marc Nichol, Nuclear Energy InstituteBill Reckley, Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Gary Becker, NuScale Power, LLC
12:45

Break

1:30

Discussion with Panel 2: Power Plant Owner/Operator Interest
Brad Adams, Southern Nuclear Company
Ralph Izzo, Public Service Enterprise Group
Tina Taylor, Electric Power Research Institute

3:00

Break

4:00

Discussion with Panel 3: Developers of Fusion Power Plants
Michl Binderbauer, TAE Technologies
Mike Delage, General Fusion
Andrew Holland, Fusion Industry Association
David Kingham, Tokamak Energy
Bob Mumgaard, Commonwealth Fusion Systems
Brian Nelson, Zap Energy Inc.

5:30

Adjourn for the day

Day 2: September 24, 2020
CLOSED SESSION
4:00 PM
Draft F&R discussion for Chapter 2 and 3
Comments on draft introductions
Plan forward, timing of next post-meeting closed session
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6:00

Adjourn
Day 3: October 7, 2020

CLOSED SESSION
11:00 AM
Committee Discussion
OPEN PUBLIC SESSION
11:30
Discussion with Panel 1: Universities
Saskia Mordijck, College of William and Mary
Jean Paul Allain, Pennsylvania State University
John S. Sarff, University of Wisconsin-Madison
George R. Tynan, University of California-San Diego
1:30

Discussion with Panel 2: Component Manufacturers
Muhammad Fahmy, Bechtel Power Corporation
Alexander Molodyk, S-Innovations
Bill Shingler, Fluor Government GroupTony S. Taylor, General Atomics

3:30

Discussion with Panel 3: National Laboratories
Dave Babineau, Savannah River National Laboratory
Steven C. Cowley, Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory
Corey McDaniel, Canadian Nuclear Laboratories
Mickey R. Wade, General Atomics

CLOSED SESSION
5:00
Panel Recap
6:00

Adjourn for the day

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