A Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory-led team was awarded $3.4M to develop new alloys for first wall fusion reactors and enable commercial fusion energy through ARPA-E’s Creating Hardened And Durable fusion first Wall Incorporating Centralized Knowledge (CHADWICK) program.
The U.S. Department of Energy's Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) has awarded a Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL)-led team $3.4 million to develop new alloys for first wall fusion reactors and enable commercial fusion energy.
The funding came through ARPA-E's Creating Hardened And Durable fusion first Wall Incorporating Centralized Knowledge (CHADWICK) program, which aims to explore a promising alloy design space and manufacturing processes to develop next-generation materials that can strengthen a fusion power plant’s first wall, which surrounds the fusion core. The LLNL-led team was one of 13 awarded nearly $30 million in total.
“This team has been selected to join ARPA-E's CHADWICK program in tackling one of the biggest hurdles in commercial fusion energy — developing advanced materials that can withstand the extreme environment inside fusion reactors. The challenge is daunting, but I believe in the team, expertise and tools,” said Aurélien Perron, the principal investigator (PI) and deputy group leader of the Actinides and Lanthanide Science Group.
Much of that expertise was developed through a Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Strategic Initiative, “Rapid Design to Deployment of Tailored Alloys.” Joseph McKeown led the LDRD with Perron and Scott McCall as the co-PIs of the LDRD.
“This is a unique opportunity to leverage the experimental capabilities and predictive material property simulations developed at LLNL to accelerate the advancement of fusion energy,” said Thomas Voisin, the co-PI and experimental lead for the ARPA-E funded project. “First wall materials in fusion reactors must endure harsh environments for extended periods, presenting a formidable challenge that we are prepared to tackle.”
LLNL is partnering with the University of California, Berkeley, University of California San Diego, VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and Curtiss-Wright Metal Improvement Company. The team will rapidly design never-before-seen materials to enhance the realization, safety and cost effectiveness of fusion power plants.
The project will employ an integrated, high-throughput modeling and experimental framework to create new materials by thoroughly exploring the complex composition space offered by low-activation elements. They will also use industrial laser technology to improve the surface of the new material to increase the chance of survival in a fusion power plant.
