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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.
S. Moriyama, T. Fujii, H. Kimura, K. Anno, K. Yokokura, S. Shinozaki, M. Terakado, S. Hiranai
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 42 | Number 2 | September-November 2002 | Pages 467-481
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST02-A241
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Research and developments on the ion cyclotron range of frequency (ICRF) heating system in the JT-60 upgrade (JT-60U) are presented. The developments and experiences on the operation of the ICRF heating system contribute to its upgrade and to future ICRF heating systems in ITER. The ICRF heating system for JT-60U started operation in January 1992. RF power up to 7 MW for 1.1 sec at 116 MHz has been coupled to a plasma as a result of the developments described in this paper. New high power tetrodes having pyrolitic graphite grids for higher dissipation of screen and control grids were tested in the ICRF amplifier, and 1.7 MW of the output power at 131 MHz for 5.4 seconds was achieved. This was the highest power level for fusion research above 110 MHz in 1990. A pair of phased loop antenna arrays (2 × 2) showed sufficiently high coupling resistance. To keep the impedance matching between the antenna and the transmission line, a frequency feedback control (FFC) system was developed, and its effectiveness was proved to couple high power RF continuously to the variable plasma. In ITER, enhancement of dielectric loss tangent of ceramics due to neutron irradiation will limit power injection capability of the antenna significantly. To solve this problem, an all-metal support (AMS) was developed in the JT-60U ICRF heating system as a substitute for a ceramic support of a central conductor of a coaxial antenna feeder in the ITER ICRF antenna.
