Choice of a low operating temperature for the DEMO EUROFER97 divertor cassette

One of the fundamental input parameters required for the thermo hydraulic and structural design of a divertor cassette is the operation temperature range. In the current design activities to develop European DEMO divertor in the frame of EUROfusion, reduced activation steel EUROFER97 was chosen as structural material for the divertor cassette body considering its low long-term activation and superior creep and swelling resistance under neutron irradiation (You et al., 2016) [1]. For specifying an operation temperature range (i.e. cooling condition) various, often conflicting requirements have to be considered. In this article the lower limit of allowed operation temperature window is defined for EUROFER97 for structural design of DEMO divertor cassette body. The underlying rationale and supporting experimental data from a number of previous irradiation tests are also presented. The motivation of this survey study is to explore the possibility to use EUROFER97 for water-cooled divertor cassette at temperatures below 350 °C which has been regarded as limit temperature to preserve ductility under irradiation. Based on the literature data of FTTT (Fracture Toughness Transition Temperature) calibrated by Master Curve method, it is concluded that EUROFER97 at the envisaged maximum dose of 6 dpa will have to be operated above 180 °C taking the embrittlement due to helium production into account.