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Fusion Science and Technology
February 2025
Latest News
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.
V. Kapychev, V. Gorokhov, D. Davydov, V. Demidov, Yu. Kazennov, V. Tebus, V. Frolov, A. Shikov, N. Shishkov, V. Kovalenko, A. Lopatkin, A. Marachev, V. Shishkin, Yu. Strebkov, L. Men'kin, A. Zyryanov
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 39 | Number 1 | January 2001 | Pages 45-53
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST01-A150
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
A model of a ceramic breeding zone has been designed and manufactured for testing in the IVV-2M fission reactor. The model contains both lithium orthosilicate and beryllium spheroid particles 1 to 2 mm in diameter. The structural material is ferritic-martensitic stainless steel. In addition, a mockup of the model for verification of neutronics calculation methods has been designed and manufactured. A special facility (Functional In-Reactor Investigations of Tritium-Breeding Models) has been designed, fabricated, and assembled at the reactor for studying the kinetics of tritium extraction from the ceramic material under irradiation. Neutronic and thermo-hydraulic calculations and an initial measurement of tritium release from the model under reactor irradiation have been performed.
