Reaching High Poloidal Beta at Greenwald Density with Internal Transport Barrier Close to Full Noninductive Current Drive

In the ASDEX Upgrade tokamak, high poloidal beta up to βₚₒₗ0ex0ex=0ex0ex3 at the Greenwald density with H-mode confinement has been reached. Because of the high beta, the plasma current is driven almost fully noninductively, consisting of $51%$ bootstrap and $43%$ neutral beam driven current. To reach these conditions the discharge is operated at low plasma current ( IP0ex0ex=0ex0ex400kA) and high neutral beam heating power ( PNBI0ex0ex=0ex0ex10MW). The discharge combines an edge (H mode) and internal transport barrier at high densities without confinement-limiting MHD activities. The extrapolation to higher plasma currents may offer a promising way for an advanced scenario based fusion reactor.