Calorimetry measurements during high energy discharges at Tore Supra

One particularity of Tore Supra is that the plasma facing components (PFCs) are actively cooled, allowing research on long duration and high energy discharges. During a discharge, a large part of the energy dissipated in the heating generators (ICRH, ECRH and LHH) and auxiliaries is transferred to the primary cooling loops (1350 and 1360). The energy, which is injected in the plasma, is totally recovered by the PFCs primary cooling loop B30. The primary loops are cooled via heat exchangers by a secondary loop. The previously existing limitations of the complete Tore Supra cooling system were due to the heat exchange performance to the secondary loop. From 2001 to 2003, the various primary loops have been upgraded and during the 2003 experimental campaign, significant results were obtained, particularly during non-inductive discharges with an injected energy by the lower hybrid current drive (LHCD) system of up to 1.1 GJ. For the long and high energy discharges, the agreement between the thermal energy exhausted from the PFCs and measured by the calorimetry and the energy injected in the plasma is very good (90-95%). Furthermore, calorimetry measurements on the various cooling loops allow to assess the global operation of the cooling system. (c) 2005 Published by Elsevier B.V.