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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. Perujo, S. Alberici, J. Camposilvan, F. Reiter
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 21 | Number 2 | March 1992 | Pages 800-805
Material; Storage and Processing | doi.org/10.13182/FST92-A29846
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The interaction of hydrogen isotopes with MANET (MArtensitic for NET) has been studied by a gas-evolution method in the framework of activities aimed at characterizing this steel. Temperatures in the range 573 – 873 K and loading pressures between 103 and 105 Pa have been used. In the temperature and loading pressure range studied, hydrogen and deuterium diffusivity in MANET is about two orders of magnitude higher than for AISI 316L (austenitic steel), ie in the range from 10−9 to 10−8 m2 · s−1. However, the solubility (Ks) in MANET is about an order of magnitude lower than in the austenitic steel, ie in the range 10−3 to 10−2 mol· m−3 · Pa−1/2. Changes of these properties caused by a phase change of the material at temperatures above 673 K are discussed. The hydrogen and deuterium data obtained were used to calculate the tritium solubility and diffusivity data by means of quantum-statistical theories.
