What must DEMO do?

The US fusion demonstration plant (DEMO) must satisfy certain top level requirements so that energy producers will confidently invest in a commercial fusion version for their next generation power plant. To instill that level of confidence to both the investor and the public, DEMO must achieve high standards in safety, low environmental impact, reliability, and economics. This is a most difficult set of goals to meet. The public is demanding ever more strict environmental rules and regulations. The hazards of radioactive and toxic waste and emissions are becoming better understood. The difficulties of establishing and maintaining long-lived repositories are enormous. Neighborhood action groups have an aversion to large power plants in their back yards. Utilities and independent power producers are reluctant to commit to a long-term financial arrangement for a new technology. To achieve these stringent goals, the competition is continuing to improve to meet these challenges. Only the best can adapt and survive. Can fusion meet the challenge? Does it have enough advantages to offset the difficulties ahead? Fusion has many inherent advantages. Fusion can be environmentally safe. By tailoring the materials used, it can achieve low level waste standards. It can meet demanding public standards for safety. It does not have a melt-down scenario. Abnormal events can be tolerated with no major hazard potential. Redundancy and robust engineering can be designed into the system and testing can verify demanding reliability standards. Plant economics can be achieved if rigid cost standards are established and maintained. The DEMO plant is not expected to achieve all requirements demanded of the commercial power plant, but it must demonstrate values close enough to the commercial machine so that extrapolation to the commercial carries minimal risk in all key areas. Specifically. DEMO must demonstrate all the major performance parameters in an integrated system similar to that of the commercial plant. It should be large enough so that all aspects of the DEMO can be confidently scaled to that of the commercial plant, including the economics, reliability, availability, and operability. The US Starlite DEMO project is establishing quantifiable top level requirements to assure that DEMO will satisfy the aforementioned needs for the commercial plant. At the same time, it must be determined that DEMO can be achieved by extrapolating today's current physics, engineering, and material databases.