Fluid turbulence simulations of divertor heat load for ITER hybrid scenario using BOUT++

Abstract

Abstract The BOUT++ six-field turbulence code is used to simulate the ITER 11.5 MA hybrid scenario and a brief comparison is made among ITER baseline, hybrid and steady-state operation (SSO) scenarios. Peeling–ballooning instabilities with different toroidal mode numbers dominate in different scenarios and consequently yield different types of ELMs. The energy loss fractions (ΔW ped/W ped) caused by unmitigated ELMs in the baseline and hybrid scenarios are large (∼2%) while the one in the SSO scenario is dramatically smaller (<1%), which are consistent with the features of type-I ELMs and grassy ELMs respectively. The intra ELM divertor heat flux width in the three scenarios given by the simulations is larger than the estimations for inter-ELM phase based on Goldston’s heuristic drift model. The toroidal gap edge melting limit of tungsten monoblocks of divertor targets imposes constraints on ELM energy loss, giving that the ELM energy loss fraction should be smaller than 0.4%, 1.0%, and 1.2% for ITER baseline, hybrid and SSO scenarios, correspondingly. The simulation shows that only the SSO scenario with grassy ELMs may satisfy the constraint.