Five organisations have secured six contracts worth £7.4m in
total with the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority to develop
lithium technology for fusion energy.
The four universities and one company have received contracts
ranging between £700,000 and £1.5m from UKAEA’s ‘Fusion Industry
Programme’.
UKAEA launched the new Fusion Industry Programme challenge
‘Realising the potential of lithium in an economic, sustainable
and scalable fusion energy fuel-cycle’ in early 2023, encouraging
organisations to develop and evaluate prototypes of lithium
technology.
Tim Bestwick, UKAEA’s Chief Development Officer, said: “Fusion
energy continues to feature on the world stage, with recent
commitments being made at COP28 to develop fusion as a
sustainable, low carbon source of energy for future generations.
“The Fusion Industry Programme is encouraging the development of
UK industrial fusion capacity and preparing the UK fusion
industry for the future global fusion power plant market.
“The organisations that have been awarded these contracts have
successfully demonstrated their lithium technology concepts and
will now develop them to the ‘proof of concept’ stage.”
The latest contracts follow the award of Fusion Industry
Programme contracts earlier in 2023, focused on digital
engineering and fusion fuel requirements, and more recently
materials
and manufacturing, and heating and cooling technologies.
Full list of organisations awarded contracts under Cycle Three,
Phase Two, of the Fusion Industry Programme:
‘Realising the potential of lithium in an economic, sustainable
and scalable fusion energy fuel-cycle’
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Organisation
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Project title
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Project summary
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Bangor University
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Lithium Isotope Microorganism Enrichment - LiME
|
Identify optimum microbe for rapid and efficient 6Li
removal. Assess total Li uptake into microbe versus
enrichment efficiency will allow computation of batch size
and residence time. Use laboratory scale techniques to
provide data on enrichment efficiency (ICPMS)
|
|
Frazer-Nash
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Lithium Enrichment Prototype Project (LEPDOS)
|
Combining technical leadership from Frazer-Nash Consultancy
Ltd and the University of Bristol to unlock innovative
plasma-based technologies capable of meeting the enriched
lithium needs of the UK and international fusion
pilot-plant generation
|
|
University of Bristol
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CENTRAL - centrifugation applied to lithium isotope
enrichment
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The University of Bristol supported by Urenco is proposing
to modify and adapt existing centrifugation technologies
for the purpose of isotopic enrichment of lithium.
|
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University of Bristol
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LIBRA - Lithium Breeder Advancement through materials
manufacture and testing
|
To evaluate the feasibility of 6LiD as a T breeding
material in a thorough and accurate way, the approach from
UoB is the establishment of a breeding blanket testing
platform to perform tests under quasi-real operating
conditions using fusion neutrons
|
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University of Edinburgh
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Development of efficient continuous tritium capture and
gaseous release through chemical control
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Deliver the requirements of the tritium extraction theme by
developing and demonstrating an integrated process capable
of effective coupled tritium production and T2 gaseous
extraction from a molten salt through chemical and
environmental control, at the required efficiency, rate and
robustness
|
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University of Manchester
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Demonstration of a Viable Process for Li-6 Enrichment to
Support Tritium Breeding
|
A lithium isotope enrichment process based on solvent
extraction using crown ethers, which has been reported to
exhibit promise but has only been studied using batchwise
small-scale tests
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