Tritium Activities at Chalk River Labs

Presented by: Donald Ryland 37th Tritium Focus Group Meeting, Rochester, New York 2016 October 27

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -1- Outline

• Management of Canadian Nuclear Laboratories • New Tritium Laboratory • Tritium Activities • Tritium batteries • Tritium resistant materials • Tritium removal by catalytic hydrogen isotope exchange • Tritium permeation through metals • Tritium concentration • He-3 recovery and purification

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -2- Management of Canadian Nuclear Laboratories

• Government Owned – Contractor Operated (GOCO)

• Mandate: • D&WM responsibilities for GOC • Nuclear science and technology for GOC • Commercial nuclear science and technology

• Manages operating contract for GOC • Owns assets and liabilities

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -3- Existing Tritium Facility

• One-of-a-kind in Canada • Six laboratories • Commercial and S&T projects

• Handles up to 1 MCi T2

• 1000 Ci/kg T2O • 12 technical staff • Housed in old building • 2.5 MCi storage

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -4- New Tritium Laboratory Building

Construction complete: Summer of 2017 Ready for operation: Early 2018

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -5- New Tritium Laboratory – Layout

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -6- New Tritium Laboratory - Features

• Handle up to 1 MCi T2 • Two inert atmosphere glove boxes (IAGB) • Tritium dispensing, materials exposure testing • Air-purged glove boxes • Maintenance tasks, experimental studies • Gas standards preparation • Tritium counting room • Tritium storage vault (2.5 MCi) • Fumehoods • Gas sampling • Tritium assay

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -7- New Tritium Laboratory - Features

• New IAGB

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -8- New Hydrogen Laboratory

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -9- Tritium Areas of Interest

• Tritium batteries (energy devices) • Tritium immobilization as hydrides • Tritium effects on materials for electrolysis • Catalytic tritium separation (hydrogen-water exchange) • Tritium permeation at high temperatures • He-3 extraction and purification • Safe handling of tritium (elemental, water) • Tritium decontamination • Commercial tritium dispensing • Production of tritium gas standards

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -10- Tritium Batteries

• Use energy from tritium decay as a power source • Low power, high reliability applications • Medical – pacemakers, hearing aids • Remote sensors – Internet of Things • Micro-electrical mechanical systems (MEMS) • Trickle-charge lithium-ion batteries • Two types: • Direct: beta → conduction electrons • Indirect: beta → photons →conduction electrons

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -11- Tritium Batteries

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -12- Tritium Batteries – Fabricating Components

Spin Coater Metal Vapour Hydriding Apparatus Prepare Deposition Determine semiconductor and Deposit thin hydrogen uptake photovoltaic material films of materials materials

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -13- Tritium Batteries – Material Testing

• Test functionality of materials - solar simulator

• Expose sample to tritium source – lights or solid 2 cm 2

2 cm

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -14- UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -14- Tritium Resistant PEM E-Cell Materials • CECE detritiation processes with PEM electrolysis cells • CECE – Combined Electrolysis and Catalytic Exchange

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -15- UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -15- Tritium Resistant PEM E-Cell Materials •In a high tritium environment, membrane must maintain • Mechanical integrity • High performance • Nafion breaks down when exposed to tritium • CNL has developed two promising proton-conducting membrane materials with improved tolerance to tritium • Outcome: Produce electrodes for full-scale e-cell – Tyne Eng. • Requires exposure to tritium followed by decontamination • Tritium strongly bound to the membrane • Exposure to tritiated water – accelerated aging • Produced 1000 Ci·L-1 tritiated water • Soak 4 x 4 cm membrane samples in tritiated water

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -16- UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -16- Tritium Resistant PEM E-cell Materials

•Decontamination of membranes •In-situ decontamination for safe handling of membranes •Effluent reduced from 1010 to 107 Bq/mL after four flushes with water •Ex-situ decontamination to reach exemption limit •Decontamination at 70 °C more effective than at room temperature

•Use of chemical reagent much more effective than water

Membrane Sample Final Elution of Water Flushing (Bq) One Step of Chemical Soaking (Bq) Nafion® N-1110 7 000 371 000 at a β-Dose of 67 kGy Nafion® N-1110 32 500 255 000 at a β-Dose of 155 kGy

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -17- Mini-CECE Test Apparatus

Test in highly tritiated environment • E-cell • Isotope Exchange Catalyst • Hydrogen-Oxygen Recombiner catalyst

Bolt Hole Through Hole

4 cm 4 Membrane Electrodes

4 cm Gasket

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -18- Catalytic Tritium Separation

• Commercial project • Tritium Removal from Light Water • CECE process • Concentrates tritium in reduced volume of water • CNL provided LPCE catalyst and consulting services • Assisted to achieve full potential of the tritium removal process

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -19- Tritium Permeation

• Inductive heat to 1000°C (within ±5°C over whole sample) • Sample: • 10 mm diameter • 50 mm long • HT flow in inner tube • Swept annulus • Measure and model tritium permeation • Materials for Molten Salt Reactors and Next Generation Reactors

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -20- Tritium Concentration

• Need at least 99% pure T2 for exploitation • Darlington and Wolsong TRF use Cryogenic Distillation • Operates at ~20 K • Established, but expensive and cumbersome • Alternatives: • Thermal Diffusion and Molecular Diffusion • Thermal Cycling Absorption Process (TCAP)

• Key to TCAP process – high performing absorber material

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -21- TCAP- Absorber Material •Producing novel absorber materials in-house •Developed efficient and effective processes for producing Pd-based absorbents on porous materials •Constructed experimental system for testing absorbers •Separate hydrogen-deuterium mixtures

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -22- Extraction and Purification of Helium-3

• Canada produces about 3 kg/a of tritium Decay product is Helium-3 • Extract He-3 from Immobilized Tritium Containers • Determine optimal processes for • Collection • Purification • Storage

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -23- Extraction and Purification of Helium-3

• Collection of He-3 • Function of temperature • Low temperature extraction • Reduces tritium content (+) • Reduces tritium permeation (+) • Reduces He-3 released (-) • Investigating collection and storage methods

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -24- Extraction and Purification of Helium-3

• Purification of He-3 • Gas must contain > 99.9995% He-3 + He-4 • < 1 µCi/m3 tritium

• < 1 ppm of other impurities (N2, O2, Ar, CO, CO2) • Collected gas contains tritium, tritiated organics, etc. • Investigating clean-up methods

UNRESTRICTED / ILLIMITÉ -25- Thank you Questions?

E-mail: [email protected]

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