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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.
Selena Ng, Dominique Grenèche, Bernard Guesdon, Richard Vinoche, Marc Delpech, Florence Dolci, Hervé Golfier, Christine Poinot-Salanon
Nuclear Technology | Volume 164 | Number 1 | October 2008 | Pages 13-19
Technical Paper | Icapp '06 | doi.org/10.13182/NT08-A4004
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Introducing neptunium into the nuclear fuel cycle has been proposed in the past as a way to impede the diversion or the direct use of plutonium to fabricate a nuclear explosive device. This paper aims to technically analyze the industrial consequences should this proposal be implemented. Two scenarios are considered: (a) adding neptunium to fresh uranium oxide (UOX) fuel before irradiation in a light water reactor (LWR) and (b) separating neptunium together with plutonium from used UOX fuel and using this combined oxide to fabricate mixed oxide (MOX) fuel before subsequent irradiation in an LWR. In both cases, assembly calculations for a pressurized water reactor using fresh fuel doped with neptunium are presented for a wide range of neptunium proportions. The consequences on the core and fuel performance and the fuel cycle are analyzed. The analysis shows that while irradiating neptunium-doped UOX fuel can offer significant proliferation-resistance benefits because of the increased quantity of the plutonium isotope 238Pu in the discharged fuel, it entails heavy industrial penalties even at 1% Np content. The use of neptunium with MOX fuel is limited to 0.5% in order to maintain a negative void coefficient. At this proportion, it offers minimal increase in 238Pu content, and it is unlikely that detectability through gamma-ray emissions of the resulting plutonium-neptunium oxide mixture is increased. The fact that neptunium itself may pose a proliferation risk must be carefully weighed in any decision to use neptunium as a tool to increase proliferation resistance.