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Commercial nuclear innovation "new space" age
In early 2006, a start-up company launched a small rocket from a tiny island in the Pacific. It exploded, showering the island with debris. A year later, a second launch attempt sent a rocket to space but failed to make orbit, burning up in the atmosphere. Another year brought a third attempt—and a third failure. The following month, in September 2008, the company used the last of its funds to launch a fourth rocket. It reached orbit, making history as the first privately funded liquid-fueled rocket to do so.
A.B. Antoniazzi, W.T. Shmayda
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 30 | Number 3 | December 1996 | Pages 879-884
Fuel Cycle and Tritium Technology | doi.org/10.13182/FST96-A11963048
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Tritiated waste and glovebox cleanup systems contain significant levels of trititated methane impurities which require reducing and processing to recover the tritium. A viable approach to the recovery of tritium is the conversion of tritiated methane into elemental tritium and carbon by thermal cracking on a heated metal matrix.
Through the conversion reaction of HTO/H2O with hot Al4C3 powder, tritiated methane concentrations in the 0.4 to 0.9 mCi/m3 range are achievable. The HTO/H2O ratio is ~10-7.
Conversion efficiencies for the decomposition of methane are measured for Zr-Fe-Mn alloy, iron oxide and supported nickel catalyst. HT and HTO are created by decomposing methane. Zr-Fe-Mn alloy achieved a maximum conversion efficiency of ~70% at 700°C. Iron oxide thermally cracked methane at 36% at a temperature of 700°C. Supported nickel operating at 450°C achieved conversion efficiencies ranging from 65 to 100%.
