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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.
John B. Rajan, Romesh Kumar, Donald R. Vissers
Nuclear Technology | Volume 83 | Number 2 | November 1988 | Pages 205-211
Technical Paper | Radioactive Waste Management | doi.org/10.13182/NT88-A34162
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
This study was conducted to develop improved treatment/disposal techniques for waste reactive metals. The basic approach considered was to convert the reactive metal (primarily sodium, with small quantities of radioactive and nonradioactive contaminants) to a glass form by reacting it primarily with silica sand, along with other minor additives to impart mechanical and chemical integrity to the waste form. A high-soda silicate glass was selected as the most desirable glass form for waste sodium disposal; however, it was found that small quantities of other additives would be necessary to impart acceptable resistance to leaching by groundwaters and other environmental stresses. Differential thermal analyses (DTA) with varying compositions of sodium oxide, silicon dioxide, calcium oxide, and magnesium oxide showed that the primary glass-forming reactions occur at <300°C. For the well-mixed samples used in the DTA tests, there were no additional thermal effects as the temperature was raised to 1260° C, indicating that the glass-forming reaction was essentially completed at the low temperature. Samples of different glasses were produced in a laboratory furnace to determine qualitative glass characteristics. Samples of sodium disilicate glass were tested for teachability of sodium by water. This particular glass had a relatively high sodium leach rate of 0.73 × 10−2 μg.mm−2.min−1 at room temperature in pure water. A conceptual one-step process for waste sodium conversion was designed, incorporating a low-g, low-pressure-drop, high-temperature cyclone as the reaction vessel as well as the reaction product separator.