ITER relevant current ramping experiments in Alcator C-Mod

ITER requires routine operation at 15 MA within the operational constraints of the device. The original proposed poloidal coil-set is specified only for rather low plasma inductance (l$_{i}$=0.7-1.0). In C-Mod, the current rise and current decay phase of the ITER discharge scenario have been studied, trying to keep l$_{i}$ low. The experiments used early X-point formation during the current ramp-up, and remained diverted during the current ramp-down. Ohmic ramp up discharges achieved li as low as 0.9 at the start of the flat top, ICRF heated discharges only reduced l$_{i}$ by $\sim $ 0.05, despite raising T$_{e0}$ from 2 keV (ohmic) to 4 keV (3 MW ICRH). For the ramp-down, l$_{i}$ could be kept below 1.2 during the first half of the current decay, using a slow I$_{p}$ ramp-down rate still consuming flux from the transformer. These dedicated experiments are supported by interpretation of the results with TSC/TRANSP, and provide input for validating the transport models used in extrapolating the results to ITER. Supported by USDoE awards DE-FC02-99ER54512 and DE-AC02-76CH03073.