Degradation in supercritical water oxidation systems

Conference · Tue Oct 01 04:00:00 EDT 1996

OSTI ID:370596

Mitton, D B; Han, E H; Zhang, S H ^[1]

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1. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology, Cambridge, MA (United States)

Supercritical water oxidation (SCWO) can effectively destroy various civilian and military wastes; however, the system will generally need to withstand a corrosive environment. To improve our understanding of degradation within such systems, systematic exposure testing is being carried out in conjunction with analysis of failed components. Various alloys have been exposed to environments ranging from deionized water to highly chlorinated organic compounds and to temperatures from 300 to 600{degrees}C. Although, not surprisingly, high corrosion rates are encountered for the chlorinated feed streams, even deionized water can be aggressive at these conditions. In chlorinated feed streams, Hastelloy C-276 exhibits premature failure at subcritical conditions as a result of dealloying and cracking. At supercritical conditions (600{degrees}C) in chlorinated environments, the high-nickel alloys and stainless steels exhibited significant corrosion. To date, titanium appears to be the most promising candidate material for use in chlorinated organics. Analysis suggests that it may be possible to alter feed characteristics to reduce degradation to an acceptable level. This may permit the use of less costly materials for construction.

• OSTI ID: 370596
• Report Number(s): CONF-960376--
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

05 NUCLEAR FUELS
32 ENERGY CONSERVATION, CONSUMPTION, AND UTILIZATION
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
CORROSION
HASTELLOY C
NICKEL ALLOYS
ORGANIC CHLORINE COMPOUNDS
ORGANIC COMPOUNDS
OXIDATION
STAINLESS STEELS
TITANIUM
WASTE PROCESSING