Energy loss for grassy ELMs and effects of plasma rotation on the ELM characteristics in JT-60U

Oyama, Naoyuki; Sakamoto, Yoshiteru; Isayama, Akihiko; Takechi, Manabu; Gohil, P.*; Lao, L. L.*; Snyder, P. B.*; Fujita, Takaaki; Ide, Shunsuke; Kamada, Yutaka; Miura, Yukitoshi; Oikawa, Toshihiro; Suzuki, Takahiro; Takenaga, Hidenobu; Toi, Kazuo*; JT-60 Team

The grassy ELM is characterized by the high frequency periodic collapse up to kHz, which is 15 times faster than that for type I ELM. A divertor peak heat flux due to grassy ELMs is less than 10% of that for type I ELMs. This smaller heat flux is caused by narrower radial extent of the collapse of temperature pedestal. The different radial extent between type I ELMs and grassy ELMs qualitatively agrees with the different radial distribution of the eigen function of the ideal MHD stability analysis. The ratio of ELM energy loss for grassy ELMs to the pedestal stored energy was 0.4-1%. In high triangularity regime, ELM amplitude, frequency and type can be changed from type I ELM to high frequency grassy ELM as counter plasma rotation was increased. In low triangularity regime, on the other hand, the complete ELM suppression (QH-mode) has been achieved, when the plasma position is optimized with CTR-NBIs. The existence of the edge fluctuations localized in pedestal region may reduce the pedestal pressure, and therefore the QH-mode can be sustained for long time up to 3.4s.