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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.
Vito Renda, Gianfranco Federici, Loris Papa
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 13 | Number 3 | March 1988 | Pages 473-483
Technical Paper | Alpha-Particle Workshop / Divertor System | doi.org/10.13182/FST88-A25125
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The latest Joint Research Centre (JRC)-Ispra proposal is presented to support the design of a divertor concept that has long been considered the most crucial component of the plasma impurity control system for the Next European Torus (NET) tokamak fusion reactor. Because of the harsh tokamak environment, the divertor panel is the plasma facing component that suffers the most severe loading conditions, such as high thermal stresses, thermal fatigue, severe erosion rates, and neutron damage. An analysis of a new divertor panel concept has evolved from the previous studies carried out at JRC-Ispra. The materials considered in this study are AISI 316 stainless steel for the cooling tubes, pure copper for the heat sink, and W-5 Re alloy or graphite for the protective armor. The panel is cooled by pressurized water circulating in U-tubes. A preliminary thermohydraulic analysis has been carried out to evaluate a set of reference parameters, such as optimum coolant velocity, maximum outlet water temperature, convective heat exchange coefficient, and the expected pressure drops in the channels. Thermal and mechanical calculations, performed by using the finite element technique, showed encouraging results about the engineering feasibility of the pressure boundary of the divertor for loading conditions similar to those of NET double null, assumed as the reference mainframe.