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International Conference on Mathematics and Computational Methods Applied to Nuclear Science and Engineering (M&C 2025)
April 27–30, 2025
Denver, CO|The Westin Denver Downtown
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Argonne’s METL gears up to test more sodium fast reactor components
Argonne National Laboratory has successfully swapped out an aging cold trap in the sodium test loop called METL (Mechanisms Engineering Test Loop), the Department of Energy announced April 23. The upgrade is the first of its kind in the United States in more than 30 years, according to the DOE, and will help test components and operations for the sodium-cooled fast reactors being developed now.
S.J. Brereton
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 21 | Number 2 | March 1992 | Pages 926-931
Material; Storage and Processing | doi.org/10.13182/FST92-A29869
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The tritium inventory in a D-T fusion experiment, like ITER, may be the major hazard onsite. This tritium is distributed throughout various systems and components. A major thrust of safety work has been aimed at reducing these tritium inventories, or at least at minimizing the amount of tritium that could be mobilized. I have developed models for a time-dependent fuel cycle systems code, which will aid in directing designers towards safer, lower inventory designs. The code will provide a self-consistent picture of system interactions and system interdependencies, and provide a better understanding of how tritium inventories are influenced. A “systems” approach is valuable in that a wide range of parameters can be studied, and more promising regions of parameter space can be identified. Ultimately, designers can use this information to specify a machine with minimum tritium inventory, given various constraints. Here, I discuss the models that describe tritium inventory in various components as a function of system parameters, and the unique capabilities of a code that will implement them. The models are time dependent and reflect a level of detail consistent with a systems type of analysis. The models support both a stand-alone Tritium Systems Code, and a module for the SUPERCODE, a time-dependent tokamak systems code. Through both versions, we should gain a better understanding of the interactions among the various components of the fuel cycle systems.