Speaker
Description
The superconducting (SC) magnet subsystems for the Material Plasma Exposure eXperiment (MPEX) provide steady state axial fields between 0.05 T and 2.5 T in order to confine the plasma generation and enable the necessary radio freqency source and heating to achieve fusion prototypic environments at different material targets. To maximize the thermal stability of the superconducting magnets and reduce the technical risk given the relative size and number of the superconducting magnets, liquid helium recondensing refrigeration systems were selected at the beginning of the design process to provide the necessary cooling load. As the design has progressed, there has been a significant disruption in global helium supply chains due to pandemic and socio-economic conditions. These conditions warranted a more rigorous assessment of the specific helium usage during acceptance testing, installation, commissioning, and operation to determine best methods to offset the cost and schedule impact to the MPEX project. A comparison was carried out, with respect to the cost of a modest helium recovery system and the planned usage for the SC magnet subsystem, to determine the cost of helium per liter and cost of electricity, where conservation and recovery would be feasible.
This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan
