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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.
Young-Jong Chung, Hee-Kyung Kim, Hee-Cheol Kim, Sung-Quun Zee
Nuclear Technology | Volume 153 | Number 1 | January 2006 | Pages 41-52
Technical Paper | Thermal Hydraulics | doi.org/10.13182/NT06-A3688
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The system-integrated modular advanced reactor (SMART) new phase (SMART-P) with a rated thermal power of 65.5 MW is currently being developed at the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute. It is an innovative design to achieve a high degree of safety by adopting inherent safety-improving features and passive safety systems. Realistic and conservative calculations and a parameter study for a steam-line pipe break have been carried out by means of the TASS/SMR code. A set of transients for the whole system of SMART-P is investigated from the point of view of fuel integrity. The results of the analyses show that the most conservative initial conditions are thermal design flow, high system pressure, high coolant temperature, and high core power. It is also assumed that off-site power is unavailable and the steam section pipe guillotine break with the least reactive control rod assembly stuck out in the fully withdrawn position is a limiting case under the most moderator density reactivity condition. The SMART-P safety systems function properly and thus secure the reactor to a safe condition with respect to the safety parameters such as the critical heat flux ratio and the pressure. Natural circulation is well established in the primary and passive residual heat removal systems and is enough to ensure a stable plant shutdown condition after a reactor trips.