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Task force charts growing interest in civilian maritime nuclear applications
Readers of Nuclear News will have heard of historical applications of civilian maritime nuclear power, like the merchant ship NS Savannah and the USS Sturgis floating power plant. With a few exceptions there has been little action in this area for over 50 years, and there are plenty of reasons and opinions as to why, but over the last few years the dramatic increase in interest from the maritime industry and its stakeholders has been undeniable.
R. Wagner, D. Demange, E. Fanghänel, T. L. Le, M. Schwarz, K.-H. Simon
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 67 | Number 3 | April 2015 | Pages 631-634
Proceedings of TRITIUM 2013 | doi.org/10.13182/FST14-T97
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The PETRA facility is the first installation in which experiments with tritium were carried out at the Tritium Laboratory Karlsruhe. After completion of two main experimental programs, the decommissioning of PETRA was initiated with the aim to reuse the glove box and its main still valuable components. A decommissioning plan was engaged to: i) identify the source of tritium release in the glove box, ii) clarify the status of the main components, iii) assess residual tritium inventories, and iv) detritiate the components to be disposed of as waste. Several analytical techniques - calorimetry on small solid samples, wipe test followed by liquid scintillation counting for surface contamination assessment, gas chromatography on gaseous samples - were deployed and cross-checked to assess the remaining tritium inventories and initiate the decommissioning process. The methodology and the main outcomes of the numerous different tritium measurements are presented and discussed.