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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. Shrivastava, M. Makwana, P. Chaudhuri, E. Rajendrakumar
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 65 | Number 2 | March-April 2014 | Pages 319-324
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/FST13-658
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In fusion DEMO reactors, the blanket requires lithium-containing ceramics as the tritium breeder material. Lithium metatitanate (Li2TiO3) is being considered as a promising tritium breeding material for thermonuclear fusion reactors because of its reasonable lithium atom density, prominent tritium release rate at low temperatures, low activation characteristics, low thermal expansion coefficient, high thermal conductivity, etc. Li2TiO3 will be used in the Indian Lead-Lithium–Cooled Ceramic Breeder concept to be tested in ITER. Li2TiO3 powder has been synthesized by the solution-combustion technique using a less expensive precursor of titanium, i.e., titanium dioxide (TiO2), at Institute for Plasma Research. Titanium oxynitrate [TiO(NO3)2] and lithium carbonate (Li2CO3) with citric acid fuel are used as the raw materials. The combustion reaction was carried out at citrate-to-metal ratios of 0.8 to 1.5, as well as for various pH values ranging from 1 to 5. Citric acid was used as a fuel material for the reaction. Calcination of the powder was carried out at 600°C. The powders were characterized for phase purity, grain size, and surface area using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, and a Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface area analyzer. Finally, Li2TiO3 pebbles were prepared by extrusion followed by spheronization with a diameter range from 1 to 1.5 mm. The details of the powder systemization, pebble formation, and their various characterizations are discussed in this paper.