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Collisional transport of impurities with flux-surface varying density in stellarators

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 August 2018

S. Buller*
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, Chalmers University of Technology, SE-41296 Göteborg, Sweden
H. M. Smith
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik, 17491 Greifswald, Germany
P. Helander
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik, 17491 Greifswald, Germany
A. Mollén
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institut für Plasmaphysik, 17491 Greifswald, Germany
S. L. Newton
Affiliation:
CCFE, Culham Science Centre, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 3DB, UK
I. Pusztai
Affiliation:
Department of Physics, Chalmers University of Technology, SE-41296 Göteborg, Sweden
*
†Email address for correspondence: bstefan@chalmers.se
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Abstract

High-$Z$ impurities in magnetic-confinement devices are prone to develop density variations on the flux surface, which can significantly affect their transport. In this paper, we generalize earlier analytic stellarator calculations of the neoclassical radial impurity flux in the mixed-collisionality regime (collisional impurities and low-collisionality bulk ions) to include the effect of such flux-surface variations. We find that only in the homogeneous density case is the transport of highly collisional impurities (in the Pfirsch–Schlüter regime) independent of the radial electric field. We study these effects for a Wendelstein 7-X (W7-X) vacuum field, with simple analytic models for the potential perturbation, under the assumption that the impurity density is given by a Boltzmann response to a perturbed potential. In the W7-X case studied, we find that larger amplitude potential perturbations cause the radial electric field to dominate the transport of the impurities. In addition, we find that classical impurity transport can be larger than the neoclassical transport in W7-X.

Information

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2018 
Figure 0

Figure 1. (a) A W7-X standard configuration vacuum field, with (b) $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}$ and (c) $n_{z0}$, for $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}(B)=\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}(B_{0})\text{e}^{-(B-B_{0})^{2}/(2\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}^{2})}-X$ with $B_{0}=B_{\text{max}}$, $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}(B_{0})=-10~\text{V}$ and $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}=0.1|B_{\text{max}}-B_{\text{min}}|$, $Z=24$, $\langle n_{z}\rangle =3.472\times 10^{16}~\text{m}^{-3}$ and $T_{i}=T_{z}=1~\text{keV}$. $X$ is an integration constant set to make $\langle \tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}\rangle =0$.

Figure 1

Figure 2. Transport coefficients, for different potential perturbation amplitudes $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}(B_{0})$, for $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}$ localized around (a) $B_{\text{max}}$ and (b) $B_{\text{min}}$. $T_{i}=1~\text{keV}$ and $n_{i}=2\times 10^{20}~\text{m}^{-3}$, $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}=0.1|B_{\text{max}}-B_{\text{min}}|$, $Z=24$, $\langle n_{z}\rangle =3.472\times 10^{16}~\text{m}^{-3}$; $D^{\text{NC}}$ refers to the neoclassical transport coefficients, while $D$ is the sum of classical and neoclassical. At amplitudes roughly within $e\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}/T_{i}\in [-0.007,0]$, the flux due to an inward radial electric field is outward but very weak.

Figure 2

Figure 3. Transport coefficient for varying $\unicode[STIX]{x1D70E}$, for $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}$ given by (6.1), with $eX/T_{i}=-0.025$ and $\tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}(B_{0})$ set to make $\langle \tilde{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}\rangle =0$. The potential is centred around (a) $B_{\text{max}}$, and (b) $B_{\text{min}}$. Unless otherwise stated, quantities have the same value as in figure 2.

Figure 3

Figure 4. Figure corresponding to figure 2, but with $n_{z0}$ concentrated around (or repelled from) the $B=(B_{\text{min}}/2+B_{\text{max}}/2)$ contour.

Figure 4

Figure 5. Transport coefficient when $B_{0}$ is changed from $B_{\text{min}}$ to $B_{\text{max}}$. Apart from $B_{0}$, quantities have the same values as in figure 2. The black lines indicate potential amplitudes at which the radial electric field starts to dominate: the solid line is where $D_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}=D_{n_{i}}+D_{T_{i}}$, the dashed is where $10D_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}=D_{n_{i}}+D_{T_{i}}$. (b) $D_{n_{i}}/D_{T_{i}}$, which is within $1\,\%$ of $2$ for amplitudes where $D_{n_{i}}+D_{T_{i}}\geqslant D_{\unicode[STIX]{x1D6F7}}$ (deviations larger than $1\,\%$ are white in the figure).