Confinement and edge studies towards low ρ* and ν* at JET

The size and capability of JET to reach high plasma current and field enables a study of the plasma behaviour at ion Larmor radius and collisionality values approaching those of ITER. In this paper such study is presented. The achievement of stationary type I ELMy H-modes at high current proved to be quite challenging. As the plasma current was increased, it became more difficult to achieve stationary conditions. Nevertheless, it was possible to achieve stable operation at high plasma current (up to 4.5 MA) and low q95 (2.65–3) at JET. One of the main reasons to revisit the high plasma current experiments done in 1997 is the higher power available and the improvement of the pedestal diagnostics. Indeed, compared with previous results, higher stored energy was achieved but confinement was still degraded. The causes of this confinement degradation are discussed in the paper.