Development of fusion fuel cycle technology at the Tritium Laboratory Karlsruhe: the experiment CAPRICE

A facility carrying the acronym CAPRICE has been erected at the Tritium Laboratory Karlsruhe to demonstrate fuel clean-up technology for ITER with tritium. The clean-up process for the recovery of molecular and chemically bonded tritium and deuterium from all reactor exhaust streams is based on the combination of hydrogen isotope permeation through palladium-silver with catalytic process steps involving the thermal decomposition of hydrocarbons and the reduction of water vapour by carbon monoxide. On the basis of the CAPRICE process and from recent results on mathematical modelling of a permeator-catalyst combination, a simple continuous clean-up concept for ITER with low tritium inventories is proposed.