Conceptual Design of a Collimation System for the CERN Super Proton Synchrotron

The Super Proton Synchrotron (SPS) is the last accelerator in the LHC Injectors Chain. Its performance is constantly being improved in frame of the LHC Injectors Upgrade (LIU) Project in order to prepare it for the future HL-LHC (High Luminosity LHC) operation. One of the LIU goals is to nearly double the intensity extracted from the SPS, up to 2.32×10¹¹ p/bunch. In recent years, nearly 10% of losses are observed for nominal intensity and LHC-type beams; they grow to about 20% for the intensity approaching the HL-LHC target. Beam losses imply activation and aging of the SPS hardware; the possibility to add a collimation system is being considered to mitigate this problem. In this paper we present studies of a collimation system design for the SPS. The concept is based on a primary horizontal collimator located in an available position with high enough dispersion, and a secondary collimator to intercept the particles leaking out from the primary collimator. Performance of the proposed collimation system is evaluated by means of numerical simulations