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Insidetechnology Issue23a Lay insidetechnology_issue23a_Layout 1 11/08/2017 11:10 Page 3 inside:technology: 2017:edition2 Tokamak Energy Ltd www.ttp.com Accelerating the development of fusion power 03 Tokamak Energy’s ST40 fusion reactor is the first controlled fusion tokamak device to be designed, built and operated by a private venture. The company aims to accelerate the development of fusion power by developing the latest generation of high temperature superconducting magnets. The tokamak is one of several types of magnetic confinement device, and by far the most-researched class for producing controlled fusion power. Key facts/data: Tokamak Energy Ltd Technology: Spherical tokamaks with high temperature superconducting magnets Established: 2009 Type: Startup Location: Oxford Employees: 35 CEO, Co-Founder: Dr David Kingham After a PhD from the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge, David Kingham started his career in the scientific instruments industry, working for VG Scientific and VG Ionex. In 1990 he joined The Oxford Trust, a charity established by Sir Martin Wood, the founder of Oxford Instruments, to encourage the study and application of science and technology, and then transferred to establish and manage its commercial subsidiary, Oxford Innovation. In 2009, he co-founded Tokamak Energy, with backing from Sir Martin Wood, and others. insidetechnology_issue23a_Layout 1 11/08/2017 11:10 Page 4 inside:technology: 2017:edition 2 Tokamak Energy Ltd www.ttp.com Accelerating the development of fusion power 04 Spherical Tokamaks (ST) Fusion Centre Culham Pioneers In the ST layout an advantage Work on tokamak reactor technology in the UK is carried out at The key architects of the START programme, Dr Mikhail is that the toroidal magnets the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority’s (UKAEA) Fusion Gryaznevich and Alan Sykes, were keen to pursue the are placed much closer to Centre at Culham, outside Oxford. It was here in the early 1990s development of the spherical reactor design, so when it was the plasma, which reduces they built the first experimental spherical tokamak known as clear that Culham would not support them they established a greatly the amount of energy START (Small Tight Aspect Ratio Tokamak). The leading device separate company, Tokamak Solutions UK Ltd, the predecessor needed to power the at the time at Culham was JET, a conventional tokamak which to Tokamak Energy Ltd. magnets in order to reach once produced 16MW of fusion power, and is still the world’s any particular level of leading fusion research device. Despite the pre-eminence of David Kingham magnetic field within the JET, the results from START, particularly the world record ratio of Here Dr David Kingham joined them as CEO and co-founder. plasma. The other advantage plasma pressure to magnetic field pressure results, prompted the He was previously director of Oxford Innovation, a startup is stability of the plasma. In UK Government to release significant funding for a new accelerator business, which was established by the founder of an ST machine, the variance programme – MAST (Mega-Amp Spherical Tokamak). The US Oxford Instruments, Sir Martin Wood. Prior to Oxford Innovation from “inside” to “outside” is Government, which had supported work on START, also decided he had worked in the scientific instruments industry. It gave much larger in relative terms, to invest in a new programme - NSTX (National Spherical Torus him a good background to understand the scientific industry and the particles spend eXperiment) at Princeton, which it viewed as a sister device and startups. much more of their time on to MAST. the “inside” (i.e. in the region of strongest magnetic field). Rush to build STs The success of START prompted a wave of interest in other countries to develop their own spherical tokamaks. However, Culham Laboratory regarded JET still as the logical route to fusion power and START and MAST only as interesting scientific experiments because of the view that it would be impossible to provide enough current through the centre column of such a compact device to reach the exceptionally high magnetic fields necessary for fusion. CEO and co-founder, David Kingham insidetechnology_issue23a_Layout 1 11/08/2017 11:10 Page 5 inside:technology: 2017:edition 2 Tokamak Energy Ltd www.ttp.com Accelerating the development of fusion power 05 Initial business plan The initial business plan aimed to create a scientific instrumentation company using spherical tokamaks with copper electromagnets to produce neutrons. David Kingham’s track record at Oxford Innovation helped attract initial investment from Sir Martin Wood, Oxford Instruments and Rainbow Seed Fund. HTS breakthrough In 2011, Kingham heard from Oxford Instruments that they had tested a batch of the latest YBCO high-temperature superconductor material from America and had been impressed by its quality and resilience. Around the same time one of the potential investors in the company asked Kingham if he could make the business plan ‘more exciting’: here was the opportunity thought Kingham, since the new superconducting material offered the ability to carry a very high current density in a high magnetic field which could solve the problem of how to generate a fusion reaction in a compact spherical tokamak. HTS materials YBCO high temperature superconductors have the ability to carry exceptionally high current densities, in excess of 100 amps per square mm, in a strong magnetic field and at temperatures of around 20 kelvin (K). This generates field strengths in excess of 20 tesla (T) on the magnet itself and about 5T at the centre of the plasma. The operating temperature of 20K is five times higher than conventional low temperature superconductors – which means it can be kept cold using much less energy. insidetechnology_issue23a_Layout 1 11/08/2017 11:10 Page 6 inside:technology: 2017:edition 2 Tokamak Energy Ltd www.ttp.com Accelerating the development of fusion power 06 Hand-tested Business Plan To test the new material Dr Gryaznevich contacted friends at the The business plan reduces the engineering challenge to Czech Technical University in Prague who agreed to let him use six steps: their tokamak reactor known as Golem for two weeks in the 1. Build a small prototype tokamak to demonstrate the concept. summer of 2011. He took 25m lengths of the HTS material and 2. Build a tokamak with high temperature superconductor wound them by hand to form the magnet as well as building a magnets to prove the material. cryostat from plywood to keep the HTS cold. Even in these 3. Reach fusion temperatures of 100 million degrees in a “rough and ready” conditions he was able to prove that the new compact tokamak in 2018. magnetic coils could carry the necessary currents and enable 4. Achieve energy breakeven conditions – where energy out of the tokamak to operate. the machine is at least as much as energy in to drive fusion reactions (target date 2020). Defies big is better 5. Produce electricity in 2025. The founders of Tokamak Solutions felt this could address the 6. Produce electricity for the grid by 2030. standard objection held by Culham and others that the centre column in an ST would be too narrow to allow a high enough First steps current in the magnet and require a In the first step the team built a ‘table-top tokamak’ - the ST25 neutron shield to protect the magnet. (denoting “Spherical Tokamak radius 25cm” where 25cm refers Given that a compact ST power plant has to the major radius of the device). Using conventional copper a volume at least an order of magnitude coils this obtained first plasma in October 2012, and a maximum smaller than ITER – the successor to JET calculated plasma temperature of one million degrees. This then currently being built in France, which is served as a test bed on which to build the future devices. They costing at least €16bn - what they had in then built a variant (ST25 1.2 HTS), using HTS coils, in mind was going to be highly disruptive. collaboration with Oxford Instruments, which achieved 29 hours continuous plasma in a live remote demonstration during the New direction Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition in 2015. Patents based on the results from Prague were filed and Dr Kingham drew up a ST40 tested business plan which set out the goal to The company is now at the ‘third step’ where an upscaled reactor develop a spherical tokamak able to design, the ST40, aims to achieve fusion temperatures of 100 supply electricity to the grid by 2030. To million degrees. The first milestone was reached in April 2017 reflect the new direction, the name of the when it successfully created first plasma. The team is now company was changed to Tokamak completing the installation of a full set of magnetic coils to Energy in 2014. insidetechnology_issue23a_Layout 1 11/08/2017 11:10 Page 7 inside:technology: 2017:edition 2 Tokamak Energy Ltd www.ttp.com Accelerating the development of fusion power 07 provide greater control over the plasma with the target to achieve Acceleration 15 million degrees by autumn 2017. This will then put it on track Kingham draws on his experience working at scientific for plasma at 100 million degrees in 2018, which is the instrumentation companies where they design and build custom temperature range required for the fusion reaction as and when instruments in very tight time-frames by working on different parts the ideal fuel, deuterium and tritium, is added. of a system in parallel. At Tokamak Energy they are applying the same approach by working on the physics of the design in Magnet challenges parallel with the magnet development. Collaboration is also vital, Achieving such a powerful release of energy is now largely an says Kingham, as many in the scientific community share the engineering challenge, says Kingham.
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