Center for Plasma Material Interactions The Case for Liquid Lithium David N. Ruzic FESAC public comment, August 7, 2007, Princeton NJ If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough. --- Albert Einstein

Center for Plasma Material Interactions Why is the plasma in a tokamak cooler by the wall? Cold molecules return from the wall and cool the plasma If there were no recycling, there would be nothing to cool the plasma Temp. radius Temp. radius Non-Zero Recycling Zero Recycling

Center for Plasma Material Interactions What does Zero-Recycling do for us? It allows a much greater portion of the plasma volume to actually make energy Temp. radius Temp. radius Non-Zero Recycling Zero Recycling Fusing Plasma Fusing plasma

Center for Plasma Material Interactions Volume of the device = Cost of device Power, too expensive to build Power, too cheap to meter

Center for Plasma Material Interactions Liquid Lithium Provides zero-recycling surfaces High power handling (flowing metal) Lowest Z possible  one-third of sputtered flux even starts as ions! Tritium inventory control and reprocessing coincident with heat removal Helium pumping may be possible Long lifetime of plasma-facing components  Infinite erosion survivability  Easy disruption recovery The future is bright --- silvery, shiny, lithium bright !