HIGH POWER ICRF HEATING ON PLT AND EXTRAPOLATION TO FUTURE DEVICES

ABSTRACT Presently, ICRF heating experiments are being conducted on PLT at rf powers up to ~ 2 MW for rf pulse durations of up to 0.30 sec. Efficient deuteron and electron heating are observed in the minority 3 He and H heating regimes. In addition, efficient ion heating in the second harmonic II heating regime has been demonstrated while no significant deleterious effects on plasma confinement or stability have been observed in either case. These results provide a credible physics base for use of combined minority-second harmonic heating regimes in future devices in which the minority regime will transition to the majority second harmonic regime as the β increases. Extentions of the heating studies to higher power, higher harmonic regimes, and especially to higher β plasmas with greater correspondence to future devices are underway. Technological development in support of these experiments and of possible reactor applications is now being incorporated into the PLT program.