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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.
J. Sanz, O. Cabellos, P. Yuste, S. Reyes, J.F. Latkowski
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 39 | Number 2 | March 2001 | Pages 996-1002
Safety and Environment | doi.org/10.13182/FST01-A11963372
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Inertial confinement fusion (ICF) devices, both test/experimental facilities and fusion energy (IFE) power plants, will operate in a pulsed mode. However, the pulsing schedule in these devices is very different, and it could range from one shot every several days in an experimental facility to some Hz in IFE reactors. The main objective of the present work is to determine whether or not a continuous-pulsed (CP) approach could be an accurate and practical methodology in modeling the pulsed activation experienced by chamber materials of both types of devices. In testing the applicability of the CP irradiation model, we used materials and neutron environment scenarios of the HYLIFE-II reactor and the NIF experimental facility. It is demonstrated that a CP approach consisting of a continuous irradiation period followed by a series of only a few pulses prior to shutdown, can efficiently model the real pulsed operating regimes of the chamber materials, in terms of both accuracy and CPU time consumption. Pros and cons of the model when compared with an equivalent steady-state (ESS) method are discussed, and comparison with the exact pulsed (EP) modeling is also performed.