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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.
Shlomo Ron, Judah Tzoref
Nuclear Technology | Volume 96 | Number 1 | October 1991 | Pages 37-49
Technical Paper | Nuclear Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT91-A35532
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The potential release of fission products during a beyond-design accident in a medium-sized high-temperature gas reactor (the HTR-500) is investigated. The DSNP modular simulation code is used to simulate a depressurization accident as well as the failure of the forced circulation of the decay heat removal systems to actuate. For such an extreme accident, the calculated maximum localized fuel temperature reaches 3040° C 43 h after the beginning of the accident. During the heatup, 3.4% of the 137Cs inventory is found to be released from the fuel elements to the primary circuit, and 4.6 × 10−2% is estimated to be released into the environment. The carbon monoxide and helium releases from the graphite matrix prove to be an important factor in sweeping the fission products from the primary circuit. The comparative consequence analysis indicates a much lower risk than in the analogous light water reactor severe accident. A design-base depressurization accident is also investigated at the beginning of the study and involves the operation of one out of the two redundant decay heat removal systems.
