The light ion pulsed power induction accelerator for ETF

The light ion Engineering Test Facility (ETF) driver concept, based on Hermes III and RHEPP technologies, is a scaled-down version of the LMF design incorporating repetition rate capabilities of up to 10 Hz. The preconceptual design presented here provides 250 TW peak power to the ETF target during 8 ns, equal to 2 MJ total ion beam energy. Linear inductive voltage addition driving a self-magnetically insulated transmission line (MITL) is utilized to generate the 36 MV peak voltage needed for lithium ion beams. The /spl sim/3 MA ion current is achieved by utilizing many accelerating modules in parallel. Since the current per module is relatively modest (/spl sim/300 kA), two-stage or one-stage extraction diodes can be utilized for the generation of singly charged lithium ions. The accelerating modules are arranged symmetrically around the fusion chamber in order to provide uniform irradiation onto the ETF target. In addition, the modules are fired in a programmed sequence in order to generate the optimum power pulse shape onto the target. This design utilizes RHEPP accelerator modules as the principal power source.