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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.
W. M. Stagey, B. L. Pilger, J. A. Mowrey, D. G. Norris, M. Dietsghe, E. A. Hoffman, B. A. Abighedid, A. W. Anthony, M. S. Ayres, T. P. Belflower, J. D. Bohner, S. F. Gaputlu, H. M. Goward, H. M. Diller, J. A. Favorite, P. T. Feir, J. S. Gustafson, N. L. Jenkins, T. L. Johnston, J. L. Martin, C. H. Nahass, D. M. Nichter, D. F. Parker, R. A. Sidwell, A. L. Turner, J. D. Wartell
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 27 | Number 3 | May 1995 | Pages 326-347
Technical Paper | Fusion Reactor | doi.org/10.13182/FST95-A30394
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
It is suggested that weapons-grade plutonium could be processed through a transmutation facility to build up sufficient actinide and fission product inventories to serve as a deterrent to diversion or theft during subsequent storage, pending eventual use as fuel in commercial nuclear reactors. A transmutation facility consisting of a tokamak fusion neutron source surrounded by fuel assemblies containing the weapons-grade plutonium in the form of PuO2 pebbles in a lithium slurry is investigated. A design concept/operation scenario is developed for a facility that would be able to transmute the world's estimated surplus inventory of weapons-grade plutonium to 11% 240Pu concentration in ∼25 yr. The fusion neutron source would be based on plasma physics and plasma support technology being qualified in ongoing research and development (R&D) programs, and the plutonium fuel would be based on existing technology. A new R&D program would be required to qualify a refractory metal alloy structural material that would be needed to handle the high heat fluxes; otherwise, extensions of existing technologies and acceleration of existing R&D programs would seem to be adequate to qualify all required technologies. Such a facility might feasibly be deployed in 20 to 30 yr, or sooner with a crash program.
