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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.
Ethan Coffey, Tim Bigelow, Ira Griffith, Greg Hanson, Arnold Lumsdaine, Claire Luttrell, David Rasmussen, Chuck Schaich, Bill Wolframe
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 68 | Number 2 | September 2015 | Pages 383-387
Technical Paper | Proceedings of TOFE-2014 | doi.org/10.13182/FST14-962
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Finite element analysis calculations are performed to determine the temperature profile in sections of the ITER Electron Cyclotron Heating (ECH) transmission line waveguide. Each aluminum, corrugated waveguide transmission line will transmit up to 1.5 MW of electromagnetic radiation over roughly 200 meters from a 170 GHz gyrotron to heat the plasma in the tokamak. The “ridged tube” waveguide has integral water cooling traces which are lined with copper tubing. Each transmission line includes miter bends which may be actively cooled and waveguide couplings, where the waveguide cannot be actively cooled due to coupling hardware. The amount of cooling water available is limited, so determining the required amount of water in the cooling lines is essential. Finite element computational analyses are performed to determine the effect of the heat load and water cooling on the temperature profile of the waveguide in various steady-state cases.
