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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.
L. El-Guebaly, P. Wilson, D. Henderson, L. Waganer, R. Raffray, ARIES Team
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 44 | Number 2 | September 2003 | Pages 405-409
Technical Paper | Fusion Energy - Tritium and Safety and Environment | doi.org/10.13182/FST03-A368
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Heavy ion beam driven inertial fusion energy (IFE) power plants employ liquid wall materials to protect the structure against the energetic x-rays, ions, and debris emitted from the target following each shot. The objective of this assessment is to identify the radiological issues of the candidate liquid wall materials (Pb, LiPb, Sn, and Flibe) using the ARIES-IFE radiation chamber environment. The issues to be addressed include the radioactivity level and liquid waste minimization for waste management. Specifically, the liquids are evaluated with regard to the Class C limitation for waste disposal, a top-level requirement for all ARIES power plant designs. Two extreme cases were analyzed; the worst case is separation of the liquid wall material (highest radiation exposure) and the breeder (lowest radiation exposure), and the best case is the mixing of the two liquid streams. Both tangential and porous wall injection schemes were examined. Pb and LiPb are more radioactive than Sn and Flibe. For the liquid breeder system, the porous wall injection scheme with mixed liquid flows results in the lowest waste disposal rating and smallest waste stream achieved in our study.