FUSION FACILITY FOR FUSION NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT.

The paper shows that timely development of fusion nuclear technology (FNT) components, e.g. blanket, for DEMO requires the construction and operation of a fusion facility parallel to ITER. This facility, called VNS, will be dedicated to testing, developing and qualifying FNT components and material combinations. Without VNS, i.e. with ITER alone, the confidence level in achieving DEMO operating goals has been quantified and is unacceptably low (< 1 %). An attractive design envelope for VNS exists. Tokamak VNS designs with driven plasma (Q ~ 1-3), steady state plasma operation and normal copper toroidal field coils lead to small sized devices with moderate cost. 1