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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.
David H. Crandall
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 21 | Number 3 | May 1992 | Pages 1451-1459
Inertial Fusion Reactor Studies | doi.org/10.13182/FST92-A29925
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Two industry-led teams have each completed new Inertial Fusion Energy (IFE) reactor studies under contract from the Office of Fusion Energy (OFE). Each team studied both a heavy-ion-indirect-driven and a KrF-laser-direct-driven reactor for electrical energy production. The reactor concepts, that will be described in other papers at this conference, are attractive and contain innovative approaches that would require development programs to implement. The “believability” of the reactor concepts could be an important issue in determining the level and nature of an IFE development program pursued by OFE. The performance of radiation-compressed fusion targets (gain curves), the required features of the drivers, the systems for delivery of targets and driver energy to the reactor chamber, and the systems for conversion of thermonuclear energy to electricity are all complex and subject to issues of technical credibility and feasibility. This paper will discuss the studies and the directions suggested by them. No strong conclusions will be drawn; the assessment of these studies and the meaning of such assessment for energy development is just beginning here.