The essential engineering aspects have been successfully demonstrated at CERN and the Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI) in Switzerland, and corroborated by numerous research institutes, including the French CEA, over a ten-year period from 1995 to 2006.Below you will find the most significant experimental validations:
- FEAT (First Energy Amplifier Test), 1995, demonstrated a substantial energy gain factor (x30) in line with predictions, paving the way for the possibility of industrial-scale energy production.
- TARC (Transmutation by Adiabatic Resonance Crossing), 1997, clarified the phenomenology of neutron physics in a large volume of lead and demonstrated the efficient transmutation of long-lived fission fragments (99 Tc,129 I).
- The n_TOF facility at CERN, following on from the TARC experiment, has dramatically enriched neutron data, enabling much more accurate simulations.
- MEGAPIE (MEGAwatt Pilot Experiment), 2002, was the first megawatt-class liquid metal neutron spallation target designed by PSI, Subatech and CEA. MEGAPIE operated successfully for four months at PSI.
- High-power 600MeV cyclotron operating at PSI since the early 1990s. The current was increased from a 0.1 mA to 2.3 mA of protons at 600 MeV. Its power is now close to START's performance target.
- Electrorefining at Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), a pilot plant for spent fuel reprocessing and actinide separation by electrorefining developed in the USA. A prototype processed 2 tonnes of spent fuel, and a plan was drawn up for a plant capable of processing 100 tonnes a year. It should be noted that electrorefining can be carried out on hot fuel after six months' storage.
In addition to these experimental validations of system components, a simulation software package, GEANT4, was developed at CERN. This open-source software is the basis of most simulations at CERN, and of the Transmutex simulation software. We are also developing a deterministic code for sub-critical systems in collaboration with the École Fédérale Polytechnique de Lausanne, and a digital twin infrastructure reproducing the functions of the entire system. This infrastructure will be the digital realization of the project, reproducing as closely as possible its behavior in normal and accidental operating situations.
All that remains is to assemble the various technologies into a functional whole. This means all that is required is an engineering effort to construct the system rather than any fundamental scientific research.
