摘要：The recent progress in fields such as High Temperature Superconductors (HT S), Additive manufacturing, new diagnostics, and innovative materials, has led to new scenarios and to a second generation of Nuclear Fusion Reactor designs. A new Affordable Robust Compact (ARC) Fusion Reactor. ARC could be a power reactor connected to the electrical grid as a load-following reactor, capable to cover peak requests and other plant shutdowns. In order to investigate this interesting potential of ARC, its more sensitive component has been analyzed: ARC vacuum vessel. The study has been split in two parts: a steady state simulation and a transient one. The steady state study has dealt with temperature, displacements and stress calculations by means of a model set up with the COMSOL platform. The transient study has dealt with temperature calculations with the same model, however during a simulation of a start-up transient, quite useful to describe a loadfollowing scenario for ARC. The results show that, in the Inconel layers, temperature does not necessarily decrease as the distance from the plasma increases. This is because neutrons have a deep penetration into matter, and their energy deposition, however radially decreasing with distance from plasma, might cause temperature peaks in structural materials, in points far from the refrigerating fluid. Hence, it is necessary to optimize the heat exchange, geometry and thickness of the components, in order to avoid hotspots. Nonetheless, no concerning hotspots have been detected in this simulation.
