Description
One of the key elements of the 2024 ITER baseline is a revised ITER Research Plan (IRP) that has been developed in collaboration with experts from the ITER Members’ fusion institutes. It outlines the new strategy and timeline to reach the ITER Project specifications (including 500 MW of fusion power production with Q ≥ 10 for durations longer than 300 s in a reproducible way) through a three-phase programme in which incremental steps are taken towards the full D-T performance with a more realistic management of nuclear licensing constraints. The strategy and sequence to develop the operational scenarios specified in the IRP have been significantly impacted by the switch of first wall armour from Be to W in the new baseline. This change can be both favourable and unfavourable for plasma operations. Although the consequences for Q = 10 performance have been analysed in detail using a wide range of high-fidelity modelling tools, the development and control of the IRP scenarios is a complex process, requiring sophisticated plasma control and protection systems (a central component of which is disruption mitigation) which must be in an advanced state of readiness at the start of operations. This talk will describe how the plasma scenarios necessary for the success of the IRP staged approach are constructed from the operational point of view, including how the return on experience from current devices and the particular constraints imposed by the ITER machine itself impact their design.