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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.
C. Saville, G. Ascione, S. Elwood, A. Nagy, S. Raftopoulos, R. Rossmassler, J. Stencel, D. Voorhees, C. Tilson
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 28 | Number 3 | October 1995 | Pages 1078-1082
Analysis and Accountancy | Proceedings of the Fifth Topical Meeting on Tritium Technology In Fission, Fusion, and Isotopic Applications Belgirate, Italy May 28-June 3, 1995 | doi.org/10.13182/FST95-A30550
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) requires control and accountability of nuclear materials for all DOE-owned nuclear materials at licensed and licensed-exempt facilities. Through a series of DOE orders (5633. 3 and associated referenced series), the DOE has set forth minimum requirements and procedures for control and accountability of nuclear materials. The TFTR has been in deuterium-tritium (D-T) operations since November 1993 utilizing DOE-owned tritium for fueling the plasma reaction. As a result of the current D-T experiments at TFTR, 30 grams of tritium have been shipped to PPPL, tracked through the tritium storage and delivery systems, processed as scrap or waste, and shipped back to other DOE-owned facilities for disposal or reprocessing. Under the guidance of the DOE control and accountability orders, PPPL is required to implement and maintain a program that includes the establishment of nuclear material balance areas, material surveillance, calibration and verification of measurement devices, graded safeguards for protection of tritium inventories, computerized tracking of measurement control points, material balance reports, shipper/receiver evaluations, and extensive DOE reporting requirements. This paper discusses the program (PPPL Material Control and Accountability Plan) that has been implemented to track DOE-owned tritium and all other accountable source material. Specifically, this paper details the methods used to measure tritium in various systems at TFTR, resolve inventory differences, perform inventory by difference inside the Tokamak, process and measure plasma exhaust and other effluent gas streams, process, measure and ship scrap or waste tritium on molecular sieve beds, and detail the organizational structure of the Material Control and Accountability (MC&A) group. In addition, this paper describes a Unix™ based computerized software system developed at PPPL to account for all tritium movements throughout the facility.