Theoretical scaling law for ohmically heated tokamaks

The electrostatic drift instability arising from the reduction of shear damping, due to toroidal effects, is assumed to be the basic source of the anomalous electron transport in tokamaks. The Maxwellian population of electrons constitutes a medium whose adiabatic nonlinear reaction to the instability (described in terms of an effective dielectric constant of the medium) determines the stationary electrostatic fluctuation level in marginally unstable situations. The existence of a random electrostatic potenial implies a fluctuating current of the Maxwellian electrons which creates a random magnetic field and a stocasticization of a magnetic configuration. The application of recent results allows the calculation of the realted radial electron transport. It is found that the confinement time under stationary ohmic conditions scales as n Tsub(i)sup(-1/2) and is proportional roughly to the cube of the geometric dimenisions. Moreover, it is deduced that the loop voltage is approximateley the same for all tokamaks, irrespective of temperature and density and to a large extent, also of geometrical conditions. Thes results are characteristic of the ohmic stationary regime and can hardly be extrapolated to order heating regimes. (orig.)