Solid-state laser driver for IFE power plants

Summary form only given. The authors present the concept of a diode-pumped solid-state laser driver in the context of a power plant for inertial fusion energy (IFE) based on the cost and efficiency analyses published for Sombrero. A systems-analysis computer code has been used to optimize the design parameters in selecting the best driver configuration. The development of this configuration poses significantly lower risks than that for other driver options, for three reasons. First, up-front costs and final technical performance risk can be significantly reduced because the system is modular and can be tested at dramatically reduced scale. Second, as a consequence of the experience gleaned from Nova and other large fusion lasers, much of the fundamental physics is already well-understood. Third, many of the novel laser technologies envisioned for the IFE driver are inherently of interest to various scientific and industrial communities.