Plasma-wall interactions and plasma behaviour in fusion devices with liquid lithium plasma facing components

The application of lithium as a self-recovery and renewable material of plasma facing components (PFC) can be used to solve steady state fusion reactor PFC problems. This paper is a survey of liquid Li use in current tokamaks. Liquid Li as tokamak limiter material has been tested in T-11 M tokamak (TRINITI, RF), in FTU (Italy) and in CDX-U (USA). The idea of T-11 M and FTU liquid Li limiters is based on the Capillary–Pore System (CPS) concept. The main feature of CDX-U toroidal limiter was free liquid Li surface. The crucial issue of tokamak is impurity contamination. Lithium experiments in tokamaks discovered that poor lithium penetration into hot plasma core from its periphery (lithium screening) and the development close to plasma boundary lithium non-coronal irradiative blanket. Lithium screening can be physical ground of lithium ‘emitter–collector’ limiter concept with irradiated blanket and PFC prevention from a high local power load up to level of ITER parameters.