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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.
R. G. Gonzalez, F. D'Auria, O. Mazzantini
Nuclear Technology | Volume 194 | Number 1 | April 2016 | Pages 61-72
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NT14-155
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Atucha-2 is a Siemens-designed pressurized heavy water reactor located in Argentina. Its geometrical complexity and peculiarity [e.g., oblique control rods (CRs) and positive void coefficient] required a developed and validated complex three-dimensional (3-D) neutron kinetics (NK) model. In the framework of the agreement between NA-SA (Nucleo-electrica Argentina Sociedad Anonima) and the University of Pisa, a detailed NESTLE (3-D NK code) model of the Atucha-2 nuclear power plant (NPP) was developed. This document summarizes the procedures for implementing oblique CRs into the RELAP5/NESTLE model: A particular arrangement of the RELAP5/NESTLE CR insertion mode for oblique CRs and an implementation into the homogenized two-group cross sections of ad hoc calculated correction factors (these parameters were obtained by previously executed Monte Carlo calculations) were developed. Some applications, among the scenarios selected to perform safety analysis (Final Safety Analysis Report) of the Atucha-2 NPP (CNA-II), are also reported: preliminary scram rod worth, analysis of a CR ejection accident, and a CR faulty withdrawal.
