Optimization of the snowflake diverted equilibria in the TCV tokamak

In support of the TCV experimental campaign aiming at studying H-mode plasmas with snowflake (SF) divertor, free boundary equilibrium and stability studies were performed with the SPIDER and KINX codes. Due to the high flexibility of plasma shaping capabilities of TCV, SF divertor conditions can be reached for various plasma geometries. However, at high plasma current some configurations require poloidal field (PF) coil currents close to the machine limit. This is particularly important when the equilibrium sensitivity to the edge pedestal profiles, which is higher than for standard X-point configurations, is taken into account. That is why the configuration optimization should also include the profile sensitivity study when planning the shot scenario.