UC San Diego

We present a model for turbulent electron thermal transport at the edge pedestal in high (H)-mode plasmas based on electron temperature gradient (ETG) turbulence. A quasi-linear analysis of electrostatic toroidal ETG modes shows that both turbulent electron thermal diffusivity and hyper-resistivity exhibits the Ohkawa scaling in which the radial correlation length of turbulence becomes the order of electron skin depth. Combination of the Ohkawa scales and the plasma current dependence results in a novel confinement scaling inside the pedestal region. It is also shown that ETG turbulence induces a thermoelectric pinch, which may accelerate the density pedestal formation. © 2013 AIP Publishing LLC.