Abstract
Electron Cyclotron Heating has been proposed for plasma initiation, startup assistance and non-inductive startup on NSTX. One physics goal of NSTX will be to establish entirely non-inductive plasma operation by utilizing ECH to provide a sufficient start-up plasma to support further current drive from other heating systems. Scaling of previous ECH-only startup experiments on CDX-U and DIII-D indicate that 400 kW of ECH should be capable of driving 42 kA of pressure driven current on NSTX and possibly higher levels after optimizing the process. Due to the low NSTX magnetic field, over-dense plasmas exist during most of the discharge so conventional ECH operation is limited to the low density startup phase. To extend the useful operating range for ECH, a scheme involving mode conversion to the electron Bernstein Wave (EBW) from either O or X mode launch is being investigated for bulk heating and current drive applications at higher density. Microwave equipment, including 18 GHz klystrons and 28 GHz gyrotrons are available at ORNL and appear ideal for use on NSTX. Preliminary pre-ionization and start-up system configurations are presented here along with discussions on various operation modes.
