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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. D. Henning, J. R. Miller
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 15 | Number 2 | March 1989 | Pages 915-921
Magnet Engineering, Design and Experiments — I | doi.org/10.13182/FST89-A39810
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) is now completing a definition phase as a beginning of a three-year design effort. Preliminary parameters for the superconducting magnet system have been established to guide further and more detailed design work. Radiation tolerance of the superconductors and insulators has been of prime importance, since it sets requirements for the neutron-shield dimension and sensitively influences reactor size. The major levels of mechanical stress in the structure appear in the cases of the inboard legs of the toroidal-field (TF) coils. The cases of the poloidal-field (PF) coils must be made thin or segmented to minimize eddy current heating during inductive plasma operation. As a result, the winding packs of both the TF and PF coils includes significant fractions of steel. The TF winding pack provides support against in-plane separating loads but offers little support against out-of-plane loads, unless shear-bonding of the conductors can be maintained. The removal of heat due to nuclear and ac loads has not been a fundamental limit to design, but certainly has non-negligible economic consequences. We present here preliminary ITER magnet systems design parameters taken from trade studies, designs, and analyses performed by the Home Teams of the four ITER participants, by the ITER Magnet Design Unit in Garching, and by other participants at workshops organized by the Magnet Design Unit. The work presented here reflects the efforts of many, but the responsibility for the opinions expressed is the authors'.