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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.
Dan Zhang (Nuclear Power Inst of China)
Proceedings | 2018 International Congress on Advances in Nuclear Power Plants (ICAPP 2018) | Charlotte, NC, April 8-11, 2018 | Pages 247-251
CSR1000 (China supercritical water reactor, 1000MWe) was developed by NPIC, as BWR, the pressure vessel’s reactor and directly circulate loop was adopted, however, the coolant will encounter double flow pass in the reactor. The passive engineering safety feature was adopted and the reactor residual heat will be removed by natural circulation of coolant. As above character, loss of feed water or loss of offsite power will cause completely loss of forced flow accident, the flow in first pass of core will encounter flow inversion during this course, these factor make the LOFA(Loss Of forced Flow Accident) become one of the most limiting accident in CSR1000. The LOFA was analyzed by APROS. The result shows, during the short time of LOFA, the passive operation of HFT will mitigate the accident, and during long term, the passive residual heat removal system will function and maintain the core within the safety state.