Considerations for a Drive Beam Scheme for a Plasma Wakefield Linear Collider

The potential for high average gradients makes plasma wakefield acceleration (PWFA) an attracting option for future linear colliders. For a beam-driven PWFA collider a sequence of cells has to be supplied with synchronised drive beam bunches. This paper is concerned with the generation, transport and distribution of these drive beam bunches in a so-called drive beam complex for a 3 TeV collider. Based on earlier concepts, several modifications are suggested. The new design includes a superconducting linac and an optimised bunch delay system with a tree structure. To verify the feasibility for the overall complex, a lattice design and tracking studies for the critical bending arc subsystem are presented. Also the feasibility of a compact bunch separation system is shown. The result of these efforts is a drive beam complex that is optimised for construction cost and power efficiency that favours unified lattice solutions.