Operation of a TFTR ion source with a ground potential gas feed into the neutralizer

TFTR long pulse ion sources have been operated with gas fed only into the neutralizer. Gas for the plasma generator entered through the accelerator rather than directly into the arc chamber. This modification has been proposed for tritium beam operation to locate control electronics at ground potential and to simplify tritium plumbing. Source operation with this configuration and with the nominal gas system that feeds gas into both the ion source and the center of the neutralizer are compared. Comparison is based upon accelerator grid currents, beam composition, and neutral power delivered to the calorimeter. Charge exchange in the accelerator can be a significant loss mechanism in both systems at high throughput. A suitable operating point with the proposed system was found that requires 30% less gas than used presently. The extracted D +, D + 2, and D + 3 fractions of the beam were found to be a function of the gas throughput; at similar throughputs, the two gas feed systems produced similar extracted ion fractions. Operation at the proposed gas efficient point results in a small reduction (relative to the old high throughput mode) in the extracted D + fraction of the beam from 77% to 71%, with concomitant changes in the D + 2 fraction from 18% to 26%, and 6% to 3% for D + 3. The injected power is unchanged, ∼2.2 MW at 95 kV.