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ANS Student Conference 2025
April 3–5, 2025
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Colin Judge: Testing structural materials in Idaho’s newest hot cell facility
Idaho National Laboratory’s newest facility—the Sample Preparation Laboratory (SPL)—sits across the road from the Hot Fuel Examination Facility (HFEF), which started operating in 1975. SPL will host the first new hot cells at INL’s Materials and Fuels Complex (MFC) in 50 years, giving INL researchers and partners new flexibility to test the structural properties of irradiated materials fresh from the Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) or from a partner’s facility.
Materials meant to withstand extreme conditions in fission or fusion power plants must be tested under similar conditions and pushed past their breaking points so performance and limitations can be understood and improved. Once irradiated, materials samples can be cut down to size in SPL and packaged for testing in other facilities at INL or other national laboratories, commercial labs, or universities. But they can also be subjected to extreme thermal or corrosive conditions and mechanical testing right in SPL, explains Colin Judge, who, as INL’s division director for nuclear materials performance, oversees SPL and other facilities at the MFC.
SPL won’t go “hot” until January 2026, but Judge spoke with NN staff writer Susan Gallier about its capabilities as his team was moving instruments into the new facility.
Dr. William Burchill retired from a career in nuclear energy that spanned over 35 years focusing on nuclear safety. He is a member of the ANS Nuclear Installations Safety; Education, Training, & Workforce Development; and Nuclear Nonproliferation Policy Divisions.
Before retiring, he was an HTRI Professor and Department Head of Nuclear Engineering for five years at Texas A&M University. Prior to that, he spent five years as the Risk Management Director at Commonwealth Edison/Exelon Nuclear.
Dr. Burchill’s career also included three years at Pennsylvania Power & Light and 25 years with Combustion Engineering (C-E), where his last position was Director, Operations and Field Engineering Services. He led the C-E response to the Three Mile Island accident.
Dr. Burchill earned a B.S. in Metallurgical Engineering (Nuclear Option) from the Missouri School of Mines & Metallurgy, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). He also holds an M.S. in Management from the Hartford Graduate Center of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
He was given the 2008 Distinguished Alumni Award, Department of Nuclear, Plasma and Radiological Engineering by UIUC, and in 2011 he was presented the Alumni Award for Distinguished Service from the College of Engineering at the UIUC. He was presented the 2017 Leadership Award from ANS and the 2020 Walter Zinn Medal from ANS. He was elected to be an ANS Fellow in 2021.
He is a past chair of the International Nuclear Societies Council.
Read Nuclear News from July 2008 for more on Bill.
Last modified May 31, 2022, 12:35pm CDT
