The Spheromak is a magnetic confinement device that is being explored in both the US and Japanese fusion programs. It is a member of the Compact Torus family of magnetic structures characterized by a set of closed, nested toroidal flux surfaces but without any coils, transformer cores, etc. protruding through the hole in the torus. The Speromak is closely elated to the Reversed Field Pinch (RFP) in that most of the magnetic field is produced by plasma currents flowing along the magnetic field lines (a near force free field) rather than by external coils. The Spheromak has magnetic field components of comparable strength in both the toroidal (azimuthal) and poloidal (in the plane perpendicular to the azimuthal unit vector) directions. The large internal magnetic energy in the Spheromak makes it rich in magnetohydrodynamic phenomena and reconnection, in particular, plays an important role in the formation, resistive decay and instability processes.

We have developed a new approach to constructing large aperture optical switches for next generation inertial confinement fusion lasers. A transparent plasma electrode formed in low pressure ionized gas acts as a conductive coating to allow the uniform charging of the optical faces of an electro-optic material. In this manner large electric fields can be applied longitudinally to large aperture, high aspect ratio Pockels cells. We propose a four-electrode geometry to create the necessary high conductivity plasma sheets, and have demonstrated fast (less than 10 nsec) switching in a 5x5 cm aperture KD*P Pockels cell with such a design. Detaid modelling of Pockels cell performance with plasma electrodes has been carried out for 15 and 30 cm aperture designs.

The beam-dump kicker magnets are located in the final focus region and, in conjunction with septum magnets, extract the beams after they have passed the interaction point (IP) and direct them to their respective dumps. Two schemes for these kickers have been under consideration; ferrite transmission line magnets utilizing technology common with damping rings and positron target kickers, and current loop magnets which are possible only for the dump kickers, where the rise time of the magnetic pulse can be comparatively longer; approximately 400 nanoseconds as compared with 50 nanoseconds for the others. A prototype ferrite kicker has been built and is undergoing tests. Since the current loop requires lower voltage and power plus some additional savings in cost, we decided to build and test a prototype. This note describes in detail an optimized design for the current loop magnets and their associated pulse circuitry.

None

None

The Energy Policy and Conservation Act (EPCA! (P.L. 94-163), as amended by the National Energy Conservation Policy Act (NEPCA) (P.L. 95-619) , requires that energy efficiency standards be established for each of 13 classes of appliances that are major consumers of energy. NEPCA stipulates that such standards "be designed to achieve the maximum improvement in energy efficiency which the Secretary [of Energ'y] determines is technologically feasible and economically justified." The Department of Energy ' announced proposed standards for 8 of the 13 classes of appliances in June 1980 and initiated public hearings on them prior to final promulgation. In January 1981, the DOE suspended this process; after re-studying the proposed standards, it announced in April 1982 a finding that no standards are economically justified.