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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.
Robert Kozma, Masaharu Kitamura, J. Eduard Hoogenboom
Nuclear Technology | Volume 118 | Number 3 | June 1997 | Pages 242-253
Technical Paper | Heat Transfer and Fluid Flow | doi.org/10.13182/NT97-A35365
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The binomial theory of void fraction fluctuations is applied to the interpretation of neutron detector signals generated by density fluctuations of the coolant in nuclear reactors. Experiments are performed at the experimental setup for noise investigations on boiling effects (NIOBE) with the injection of nitrogen bubbles into a narrow coolant channel. NIOBE is a thermal-hydraulic loop located in the Higher Educational Reactor (Hoger Onderwijs Reactor) of the Interfaculty Reactor Institute, Delft, The Netherlands. The monitored two-phase-flow parameters include the size of bubbles and the density of bubble populations within the field of view of the neutron detectors, as well as local void fraction. Based on the experiments, a quantitative relationship is established between the parameters of two-phase flows and the measured neutron noise intensity. The validity of the results is not restricted to research reactor applications, and the conclusions can be used to monitor two-phase-flow coolant in power reactors as well.
