Tritium Management in the Burner

Side D-D reactions breed small amounts of tritium; the burner captures and reuses or contains it rather than releasing it.

An unavoidable byproduct

The burner's primary fuel is D-3He, but any deuterium plasma also runs D-D reactions. One D-D branch produces tritium plus a proton. That tritium is a radioactive hydrogen isotope with a 12.3-year half-life, so even the small quantities the burner makes must be handled deliberately — collected, accounted for, and either burned in place or contained.

In-situ burn and capture

• Bred tritium can fuse with deuterium in the plasma, contributing to the 14 MeV component of the neutron fraction
• Unburned tritium is pumped out with the exhaust by the vacuum system
• Tritium is separated from exhaust gas and stored or recycled
• Permeation barriers limit tritium migration into structures and coolant

Small inventory, careful handling

Because the burner is not a D-T machine, its tritium inventory is far smaller than a deuterium-tritium plant's, which simplifies the safety case and licensing. Even so, tritium handling follows the same rigorous accountancy used across the fusion field: mass balance, permeation control, and monitored effluent so nothing is vented uncontrolled.

This byproduct tritium is also a legitimate product in the broader Kronos picture — tritium is scarce and valuable — but on these machine pages it is treated purely as an inventory to manage safely. The quantities are set by the D-D reaction rate in the design-point plasma and are part of the burner's activation and effluent accounting.