Fusion for Energy: Nuclear Data Development

General Backqround and Needs of the Joint Undertaking

The European Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy, (hereinafter "Fusion for Energy" or nF4En or'the Joint Undertaking") is a joint undertaking created under the Euratom Treaty by a decision of the Council of the European Union 1. lt provides the contribution of Euratom to the ITER international fusion organisation, e.g. with regard to scientific and technological research and development activities. ln order to pursue the above objectives and in compliance with its defined scope, F4E intends
to initiate a grant agreement with one or more beneficiaries, to which this Call for Proposals refers.

The implementation of the Fusion for Energy programme requires a well-qualified nuclear database and validated computational tools for reliable neutronics and activation calculations.

A medium term strategy for producing and improving these databases and tools was implemented years ago by the European Fusion Development Agreement and consolidated in 2009 with the first Fusion for Energy grant for Nuclear Data (F4E-2008-GRT-014). The
activities in that grant were focused on the perceived needs of ITER, ITER TBMs and lFMlF.

During these previous programmes, the EU has been conducting a unique effort on nuclear data for fusion technology applications with the support to the EFF (European Fusion File) and EAF (European Activation File) projects. This has led to the development of nuclear data 1 Council Decision (Euratom) No 2007/198 of 27 March 2007 establishing the European Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy libraries such as EFF-3 and EAF-2010, and to their experimental validation in fusion relevant
conditions.

The validation of ITER and TBM design calculat¡ons is ach¡eved through integral benchmark experiments where mock-ups are irradiated with 14 MeV neutrons and nuclear responses of interest are measured and compared to calculations, which simulate the experimental setup. For validating activation data of fusion materials, including impurities, small material samples are irradiated in well characterized 14-MeV neutron fields.

Progress on innovative measurement techniques and adaptation of existing technologies has been supported during the last years but additional developments are still required. The current grant is the continuation of the program implemented in 2009 and it is divided in two actions with activities in the different domains commented above.