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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.
A.A. Yukhimchuk, S.K. Grishechkin, M.E. Notkin, R.K. Musyaev, B.S. Lebedev, A.O Busnyuk, Yu.I. Vinogradov, V.N. Alimov, A.I. Livshits
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 41 | Number 3 | May 2002 | Pages 929-933
Material Interaction and Permeation | Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference on Tritium Science and Technology Tsukuba, Japan November 12-16, 2001 | doi.org/10.13182/FST02-A22721
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The experimental setup is put in operation designed to study the phenomenon of the superpermeation of hydrogen isotopes, including tritium, through metals and to demonstrate the possibility of membrane pumping. The permeation of atomic hydrogen through the niobium membrane was shown to occur in the superpermeation regime. For the first time superpermeation of tritium through a metallic membrane was experimentally observed. The possibility of effective pumping, compression and recuperation of hydrogen isotopes by means of superpermeable membrane was demonstrated.