Fusion reactor

• US 5,160,694 A
• Filed: 12/26/1990
• Issued: 11/03/1992
• Est. Priority Date: 01/22/1990
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Werner Steudtner
• Original Assignee: Werner Steudtner
• Inventors: Steudtner, Werner
• Primary Examiner(s): Wasil, Daniel D.
• Application Number:
  US07/633,961
• Time in Patent Office: 678 Days
• Field of Search: 376/107, 376/146, 376/144
• US Class Current: 376/107
• CPC Class Codes: G21B 1/05 with magnetic or electric plasma confinement
• CPC Class Codes: H05H 1/11 using cusp configuration H05H1/14 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 30/10 Nuclear fusion reactors

Abstract

Fusion reactor (36) based on the cusped geometry concept in which the problem of indefinite tight plasma containment with inherent stability and high compression of the contained plasma in the reaction zone (19) is solved by an electric potential pot (22) surrounding the reaction zone and having an ion source (37) at the upper potential pot edge (38).

Claims

1. Fusion reactor comprising a reaction zone, a magnetic field with magnetic flux lines surrounding the reaction zone, the magnetic flux lines being curved convexly seen from the reaction zone in the nearer surrounding of the reaction zone,

an electric potential pot formed by an electric field surrounding the reaction zone for conversion of kinetic energy of ionized reactants escaping from the reaction zone into potential energy thereof and for subsequent return of the ionized reactants into the reaction zone with reconversion of their potential energy into kinetic energy,

an ion source in an upper area of the electric potential pot distributed over a ringlike-shaped area surrounding the reaction zone, wherein the reaction zone is positioned in a center region of the electric potential pot surrounding the reaction zone, the portions of the magnetic flux lines extending within the electric potential pot in the region between the upper area of the electric potential pot and the reaction zone run substantially perpendicularly to equipotential lines of the electric field forming the electric potential pot, and

the electric potential pot comprises at least an electrode in its upper area and at least an electrode in its bottom area in the nearer surrounding of the reaction zone being heated to a temperature within an upper part of the temperature range of liquidity of lithium.

2. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 wherein to the upper area of the potential pot ionized reactants are supplied and accelerated by the potential difference between the electrodes in the upper and the bottom area of the potential pot up to a kinetic energy sufficient for fusion and upon not meeting another reactant in the reaction zone pass the center at a high speed corresponding to their kinetic energy and at the opposite side of the potential pot to their supply side again run against the potential difference at a decreasing speed towards the upper area of the potential pot until their kinetic energy, shortly before reaching the electrode in the upper area of the potential pot, is again converted into potential energy, so that the process of accelerated movement towards the bottom area of the potential pot and the subsequent decelerated movement towards the upper area of the potential pot may be repeated any number of times up to a fusion reaction in the reaction zone and consequently a large portion of the reactants supplied to the upper area of the potential pot may be brought into fusion reaction.

3. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 comprising means for supplying the reactor with a reaction gas consisting at least partially of deuterium and for ionizing and supplying said gas to the reactor in the upper area of the potential pot.

4. Fusion reactor according to claim 3 wherein the means for ionizing and supplying the reaction gas to the reactor comprise a glow discharge chamber in the upper area of the potential pot being provided for supplying ionized reactants to the potential pot in form of canal rays, with a cathode designed in the manner of a Lenard tube and comprising a metal film being permeable to the canal rays.

5. Fusion reactor according to claim 4 comprising means for generating a so-called Berghaus current-intensive glow discharge in the glow discharge chamber.

6. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 wherein the electric potential pot has substantially the form of a rotationally symmetrical cavity having a cross-section substantially in the form of two opposing sectors of a circle, with the cusps of the two sectors which form the cross-section coinciding with the axis of symmetry of the rotationally symmetrical cavity and a median dividing said two sectors each into two identical parts standing vertically on said axis of symmetry and said upper area of the electric potential pot lying in the region of the arc of the sectors.

7. Fusion reactor according to claim 6 wherein the apex angle of the sectors is between 10°

and 80°

.

8. Fusion reactor according to claim 6 comprising at the substantially cone-shaped side surfaces of the rotationally symmetrical cavity spatially defining the electric potential pot, means for lateral electric screening of the potential pot as well as for achieving a potential profile along the screening which is higher than or approximately the same as the potential profile along said median depending upon the distance from the potential pot center.

9. Fusion reactor according to claim 8 wherein the means for screening and for achieving said potential profile comprise stacked rings consisting of an electrically conducting material, each of which being substantially in the shape of a short truncated cone and fits on top of the preceding ring in the stack in such a way that the ring edges of all the stacked rings together define at one side one of said substantially cone-shaped side surfaces of the rotationally symmetrical cavity.

10. Fusion reactor according to claim 9 wherein the rings are electrically insulated from one another, by means of electrically non-conducting coatings and are individually connected to direct voltage sources each supplying the intended potential of the ring.

11. Fusion reactor according to claim 9 wherein the rings are electrically connected to one another by high-resistance resistors formed by electrically poorly conducting coatings and means are provided for generating a current flowing through the stack and producing at the high-resistance resistors the voltage drops required for said potential profile.

12. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 comprising, for generating the magnetic field surrounding the reaction zone, two coils with a substantially triangular winding cross-section disposed coaxially to the reaction zone and to the potential pot on either side of the reaction zone and the potential pot, with coil currents of at least approximately the same magnitude flowing in opposite directions through said coils.

13. Fusion reactor according to claim 12, comprising, for increasing the magnetic field strength in the reaction zone and in particular between the reaction zone and the material walls surrounding it, a substantially hollow sphere-shaped reactor shell enclosing the coils and the potential pot and consisting of a ferromagnetic material one side of the substantially triangular winding cross-section of the coils being adjacent to the reactor shell inner wall and extending approximately parallel thereto, and a linear extension of the median between the other two sides of the triangular winding cross-section extending through the center of the reaction zone.

14. Fusion reactor according to claim 12 wherein the coils are superconducting coils comprising tubular windings with a cooling medium formed by a liquefied gas flowing through the windings and keeping the current-conduction walls of said tubular windings at a temperature within the superconductivity range of the material of said walls, comprising means for supplying the cooling medium to the coils and heat insulating means for each of the two coils.

15. Fusion reactor according to claim 12 wherein the substantially triangular winding cross-section of the coils has substantially the form of an equilateral triangle and the windings of the coils are formed by tubular conductors whose line cross-section likewise has the external shape of an equilateral triangle, and wherein the median between the two triangle sides, pointing approximately toward the reaction zone, of the substantially triangular winding cross-section of the coils makes an angle in the region of 30°

to 55°

, with the axis of the coaxially arranged coils.

16. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 comprising, for capture and chemonuclear conversion of neutrons liberated in nuclear fusion reactions, a blanket surrounding the reaction zone and the potential pot in which liquid blanket lithium flows from a storage tank, disposed in the region of the upper area of the potential pot and covering the potential pot in this region, along the side surfaces of the potential pot into the region surrounding the reaction zone and from there approximately in the direction of the axis of reaction zone and potential pot into a collecting tank, and wherein the collecting tank is connected to the storage tank over a tritium stripper and a first heat exchanger and a lithium pump for circulating the liquid lithium through the blanket.

17. Fusion reactor according to claim 16 wherein the flow cross-section for the liquid lithium is at least approximately constant in the portions of the blanket extending along the side surfaces of the potential pot and approximately in the direction of the axis of reaction zone and potential pot in order to achieve a substantially constant flow rate of the lithium in said portions of the blanket and wherein the width of the, in said portions of the blanket, annular flow cross-section is for this purpose at least approximately inversely proportional to the mean diameter of the annular flow cross-section or to the mean distance of the flow cross-section from the axis of reaction zone and potential pot.

18. Fusion reactor according to claim 16 wherein the first heat exchanger gives up its heat to a potassium circuit passing through a second heat exchanger and a potassium turbine and the potassium turbine drives a first generator for generating electric energy.

19. Fusion reactor according to claim 18 wherein the second heat exchanger gives up its heat to a water/steam circuit passing through a steam turbine and a condenser and a pump and the steam turbine drives a second generator for generating electric energy.

20. Fusion reactor according to claim 1 comprising means for supplying reactants to the reaction zone and for discharging reaction products and excess reaction gas from the reaction zone, said means comprising at least one gas reservoir for gas to be supplied to the reaction zone, supply means with a supply channel coaxial to the axis of the reactor, for supplying reaction gas from at least one gas reservoir to the reaction zone, discharge means with a discharge channel coaxial to the axis of the reactor for carrying reaction products and excess reaction gas away from the reaction zone, a gas separating system for the gas coming from the reaction zone and a gas pump for conveying gas out of the reaction zone.