Pathway to a lower cost high repetition rate ignition facility

An approach to a high-repetition ignition facility based on direct drive with the krypton-fluoride laser is presented. The objective is development of a Fusion Test Facility that has sufficient fusion power to be useful as a development test bed for power plant materials and components. Calculations with modern pellet designs indicate that laser energies well below a megajoule may be sufficient. A smaller driver would result in an overall smaller, less complex and lower cost facility. While this facility might appear to have most direct utility to inertial fusion energy, the high flux of neutrons would also be able to address important issues concerning materials and components for other approaches to fusion energy. The physics and technological basis for the Fusion Test Facility are presented along with a discussion of its applications. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.