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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.
K. Isobe et al.
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 48 | Number 1 | July-August 2005 | Pages 302-305
Technical Paper | Tritium Science and Technology - Tritium Handling Facilities | doi.org/10.13182/FST05-A932
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The behavior of tritium release from the vacuum vessel of JT-60U during air exposure phase at controlled water vapor concentration and gas purging in the wall conditioning phase has been investigated. For the air exposure with varying water vapor concentrations of 40ppm, 300ppm, 680ppm and 3400ppm, tritium concentration in the vacuum vessel of JT-60U was measured. At each water vapor concentration, tritium concentration initially increased with time and then became steady finally. The steady tritium concentration increased with water vapor concentration. The total amount of tritium released from the vacuum vessel was 13MBq for 3400ppm. This amount is almost the same as that removed by 5 hours' H2-GDC, which has been the most effective method for tritium removal from JT-60U. This suggests that tritium in the vacuum vessel of JT-60U can be easily removed by water vapor. Tritium released into exhaust gas during gas purging was also measured for varying gases (H2, He and Ar), at different pressures and temperatures of the vacuum vessel. Tritium concentration of the exhaust gas was about 0.1Bq/cm3 at room temperature and was independent of gas species within the pressure from 0.05 to 0.3 Pa. This result indicates that isotope exchange of tritium with hydrogen molecules was not so active under these purge conditions.
