A Scoping Nucleonics Study for Fusion High-Temperature Blanket Designs

A scoping study was performed to explore tritium breeding and energy-temperature splits in various blanket concepts for high-temperature process heat. Temperature limits for the lithium materials necessitate two blanket zones. One delivers heat at moderate temperatures (≾600°C) and breeds tritium. The other is a nonbreeding zone that produces heat at high temperatures. We find that a system where all blanket modules breed tritium delivers more high-temperature heat than one where only some of the blanket modules produce tritium. Of those considered, a design where the high-temperature zone is placed between two breeding zones produces the highest fraction of high-temperature heat. When liquid lithium, Li₇Pb₂ and Li₂O tritium breeding materials are employed with two breeding zones, a tritium breeding ratio of 1.1 can be achieved while delivering 30 to 40% of the blanket heat at high temperature.