Impacts of licensing evaluation methods on the design and regulatory burden of commercial fusion facilities

First speaker: R. Patrick White

MIT PSFC

Tuesday, October 27, 2020

4:30pm

Virtual

PSFC Student Seminars

The successful commercialization of fusion energy will require the development or adoption of licensing evaluation methods to assess the safety of fusion facilities within different regulatory frameworks. The licensing evaluation methods selected for commercial fusion will have a significant impact on the both the design and regulatory burden of commercial fusion facilities – ultimately affecting the economic viability of the technology. Understanding these impacts and selecting appropriate methods is one of the keys to the successful development and deployment of fusion energy. In this talk, we will systematically identify and estimate the tritium hazards of commercial-scale fusion relevant to licensing. The off-site accident consequences are calculated and presented for four proposed licensing evaluation methods: worst case release, maximum credible release, deterministic design basis release, and probabilistic design basis release. The impacts of these licensing evaluation methods on facility design characteristics and regulatory burden for commercial fusion are then identified and discussed. These results highlight the importance of incorporation of licensing considerations into the pre-conceptual development of commercial fusion energy.