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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.
N. Akino et al.
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 47 | Number 3 | April 2005 | Pages 758-762
Technical Paper | Fusion Energy - Plasma Engineering, Heating, Current Drive, and Control | doi.org/10.13182/FST05-A777
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
In the neutral beam injection (NBI) system, an extension of the pulse duration up to 30 sec has been intended to study quasi-steady state plasma on JT-60U. The four positive-ion based (P-NBI) units, which tangentially inject neutral beam to plasma, were mainly modified on the electric power supplies and the beam limiters to extend the pulse duration up to 30 sec with 2 MW at 80 keV per each. The seven P-NBI units, each of which perpendicularly injects for 10 sec, were conducted to operate in series for the total pulse duration of 30 sec. The ion source of the negative-ion based (N-NBI) unit, whose target beam energy is 500 keV for 10 sec, was also modified to reduce the heat load of the grid for long pulse operation. The reduction of the re-ionization of the neutral beam in the beam drift duct was a key to achieve a long pulse injection. It was found that the pressure rise in the beam drift duct, which gives the re-ionization rate, depended on the temperature of the re-ionization plates during NBI injection. Up to now, it was attained successfully that the pulse duration of the tangential P-NBI unit was extended up to 30 sec. 310 MJ of the total integrated injection energy into JT-60U plasma was achieved, including the negative-ion based NBI operation for 17 sec at 366 keV.