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Fusion Science and Technology
Latest News
Glass strategy: Hanford’s enhanced waste glass program
The mission of the Department of Energy’s Office of River Protection (ORP) is to complete the safe cleanup of waste resulting from decades of nuclear weapons development. One of the most technologically challenging responsibilities is the safe disposition of approximately 56 million gallons of radioactive waste historically stored in 177 tanks at the Hanford Site in Washington state.
ORP has a clear incentive to reduce the overall mission duration and cost. One pathway is to develop and deploy innovative technical solutions that can advance baseline flow sheets toward higher efficiency operations while reducing identified risks without compromising safety. Vitrification is the baseline process that will convert both high-level and low-level radioactive waste at Hanford into a stable glass waste form for long-term storage and disposal.
Although vitrification is a mature technology, there are key areas where technology can further reduce operational risks, advance baseline processes to maximize waste throughput, and provide the underpinning to enhance operational flexibility; all steps in reducing mission duration and cost.
D. R. Harding, J. Ulreich, M. D. Wittman, R. Chapman, C. Taylor, R. Taylor, N. P. Redden, J. C. Lambropoulos, R. Q. Gram, M. J. Bonino, D. W. Turner
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 73 | Number 3 | April 2018 | Pages 324-334
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2017.1374812
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Improving the performance of direct-drive cryogenic targets at the Omega Laser Facility requires the development of a new cryogenic system to (1) field nonpermeable targets with a fill tube and (2) provide a clean environment around the target. This capability is to demonstrate that imploding a scaled-down version of the direct-drive ignition target for the National Ignition Facility (NIF) on the OMEGA laser will generate the hot-spot pressure that is needed for ignition; this will justify future cryogenic direct-drive experiments on the NIF cryogenic targets. The paper describes the target, the cryogenic equipment that is being constructed to achieve this goal, and the proposed target delivery process. Thermal calculations, fill tube–based target designs, and structural/vibrational analyses are provided to demonstrate the credibility of the design.
This new design will include capabilities not available (or possible) with the existing OMEGA cryogenic system, with the emphasis being to preserve a pristinely clean environment around the target and to provide upgraded diagnostics to characterize both the ice layer and the target’s surface. The conceptual design is complete and testing of prototypes and subcomponents is underway. The rationale and capabilities of the new design are discussed.