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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.
Aydin Karahan, Jacopo Buongiorno, Mujid S. Kazimi
Nuclear Technology | Volume 171 | Number 1 | July 2010 | Pages 38-52
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT10-A10771
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The large assembly with small pins (LASP) concept is an evolutionary boiling water reactor (BWR) fuel assembly design aimed at increasing the power density of BWR cores while keeping the same power-to-flow ratio, core inlet conditions, and fuel-to-moderator ratio. It is based on replacing four traditional assemblies and their large interassembly water gap regions with a single large assembly surrounded by a narrower gap region. The traditional BWR cylindrical UO2-fueled Zr-clad fuel pin design is retained, but the pins are arranged on a 22 × 22 square lattice. Twenty-five water rods within the assembly maintain the moderating power and accommodate as many finger-type control rods. The technical characteristics of LASP were evaluated and are systematically compared with a traditional 9 × 9 fuel assembly. This design study includes analyses of the steady-state thermal hydraulics, two-dimensional and three-dimensional burnup-dependent neutronics, flow-induced vibrations, and fuel pin thermomechanical behavior. Furthermore, the conceptual mechanical design of the LASP assembly is discussed. The analyses show that LASP can operate at a power density that is 20% higher than the traditional BWR assemblies while maintaining the same safety margin.
