COOLING WATER AND DEMINERALIZER ACTIVITIES IN NMSR

Technical Report · Wed May 14 04:00:00 EDT 1958

OSTI ID:4250161

Culver, H N

The activity in the cooling water and in the demineralizer is examined for activities resulting from water impurities, corrosion products, fission products and recoil atoms. The specific activity in the coolant resulting from these mechanisms is compared to the intrinsic activity in the coolant for two purification rates. The relative importance of corrosion and recoil activity is compared for reactor systems in general and specifically for the NMSR. The shielding requirements at the demineralizer are examined for an assumed rate of fuel element rupture and for demineralizer operation of 50 and 100 daps. (auth) l6625 The system was operated for 2623 hours at 1400 psi and 280 deg C. The fuel was 0.042 m UO/sub 2/SO/sub 4/ solution containing 0.025 m H/sub 2/SO/sub 4/ and 0.025 m CuSO/sub 4/. The generalized corrosion rate with a titanium letdown heat exchanger in the system was 0.80 mpy as compared to runs with a 347 SS heat exchanger in which the corrosion rate was 1.5 mpy. This corresponds to a 2.9 mpy generalized corrosion rate for the stainless steel heat exchanger. A preliminary solution inventory study was made which showed that the variance in the dump tank inventory was 180 times as large as in any other part of the system. A more accurate method to measure the contents of the dump tank will be required for a good system inventory. Precipitation of uranium between the pressurizer and the main loop was shown to depend upon the pressurizer purge rate and excess acid concentration At 60% excess acid uranium would precipitate with the purge flow above 3 gph and at 55% excess acid uranium would precipitate above 2 gph purge flow. The fuel mixing rate into the motor end of the circulating pump was 2.7 to 3 liters per hour for 2200 hours of the rm and then dropped steadily to 0.04 liters per hour during the last 40O hours. No explanation has been found for this change. (auth) l6626 The initail HRT fuel charge, containinated with over 500 g corrosion product nickel, was processed to recover the D/sub2/O and was transferred to Bldg. 3503 on September 26. l958, for uranium decontamination. A total of 379 lb of D/sub2/O was recovered from an estimated inventory of 4lO lb. A total of 5.92 kg of uranium was transferred compared to a book inventory of 6.32 kg. The difference is thought to be that held up in the reactor or transfer piping since ro krown losses occurred in the transfer operations. (auth)

• Research Organization: Oak Ridge National Lab., Tenn.
• DOE Contract Number: W-7405-ENG-26
• NSA Number: NSA-13-016624
• OSTI ID: 4250161
• Report Number(s): CF-58-5-83
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

ACTIVATION
CORROSION
FAILURES
FISSION PRODUCTS
FUEL ELEMENTS
IMPURITIES
OPERATION
POWER PLANTS
REACTORS
RECOILS
SAVANNAH
SEPARATION PROCESSES
SHIELDING
SHIPS
WATER
WATER COOLANT