Plasma exhaust and density control in tokamak fusion experiments with neutral beam or ICRF auxiliary heating

Particle exhaust studies have been carried out with the pump limiter ALT-II in the TEXTOR tokamak, under ohmic conditions as well as with NBI and with ICRF auxiliary heating, and the pumping effectiveness is shown to meet the requirements for a fusion reactor. Quantitative measurements of D alpha emission, made with a CCD camera, have been used to determine the particle efflux from the plasma. Roughly one third of the D alpha emission occurs in a diffuse 'halo' that surrounds the limiter belt. The particle confinement time is less than the energy confinement time by a factor of typically 4. Modelling in 2-D of plasma and neutral hows in the TEXTOR boundary has been performed. The source of D(+) ions can be related to the D alpha emission by a factor that is found to depend on the location of the emission and on the discharge density. The predicted total D alpha emission agrees with the measurements within a factor of about 2. Pumping of ALT-II allows for density control; with NBI, the density can be increased well beyond the ohmic limit without the discharge ending in disruption. The plasma particle efflux and the pumped flux both increase with density as well as with heating power. The exhaust efficiency is typically, similar to 2%, with the highest values observed in high density NBI discharges. Higher exhaust rates are observed with NBI than with ICRF. Plasma and neutral hows in the ALT-II scoops have been simulated, making use of a simple plasma model. The scoop may be viewed as a non-linear amplifier of the plasma particle flux; the amplification is found to range from about 2 to 3 for most cases. Flow reversal in the scoop is found in some of the NBI cases and particularly in the highest density case.