Turbulent and neoclassical impurity transport in tokamak plasmas

Abstract

Impurity particle transport in tokamaks is studied using an electrostatic fluid model for main ion and impurity temperature gradient (ITG)͒ mode and trapped electron (TE͒) mode turbulence in the collisionless limit and neoclassical theory. The impurity flux and impurity density peaking factor obtained from a self-consistent treatment of impurity transport are compared and contrasted with the results of the often used trace impurity approximation. Comparisons between trace and self-consistent turbulent impurity transport are performed for ITER-like profiles. It is shown that for small impurity concentrations the trace impurity limit is adequate if the plasma is dominated by ITG turbulence. However, in case of TE mode dominated plasmas the contribution from impurity modes may be significant, and therefore a self-consistent treatment may be needed