Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium

Garlea, Elena; Bennett, B. N.; Martin, Madhavi Z.; Bridges, R. L.; Powell, G. L.; Leckey, John H.

doi:10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651

Title: Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium

Abstract

Using a compact hand-held laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) instrument, studies were conducted on specimens of uranium charged with controlled hydrogen concentrations for a qualitative evaluation of hydride corrosion. Four samples of depleted uranium with two different starting microstructures (cast and rolled) were used for this study. The hydrogen charged samples (rolled 1.8 wppm H and cast 14 wppm H by weight) are representative of the pre-corrosion states with hydrides distributed throughout the bulk. In-depth LIBS measurements were carried out, after the thick surface corrosion layer was removed, by applying 100 laser pulses from sample surface into the bulk on five different sample locations. Three additional areas on each sample were studied by laser ablation using a 12-point grid approach. The atomic emission signals of elemental uranium, carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen were identified and analyzed. All four samples showed similar uranium and carbon concentrations, as expected. Hydrogen content was consistent with each sample’s specification, such that the hydrogen charged samples exhibited higher hydrogen concentration than their references. Both specimens charged with hydrogen showed elevated oxygen content as well, due to rapid oxidation of uranium and uranium hydrides. The oxidation process was facilitated by the laser ablation and plasma plume’s high temperaturemore »« less

Authors:

Garlea, Elena ^[1]; Bennett, B. N. ^[1];

^[1]; Bridges, R. L. ^[1]; Powell, G. L. ^[1]; Leckey, John H. ^[1]

Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)

Publication Date:: Mon Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2019

Research Org.:: Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States); Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant (Y-12), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)

OSTI Identifier:: 1546542

Alternate Identifier(s):: OSTI ID: 1560526; OSTI ID: 2325513

Report Number(s):: IRO-10459
Journal ID: ISSN 0584-8547

Grant/Contract Number:: AC05-00OR22725; NA-0001942; NA0001942

Resource Type:: Accepted Manuscript

Journal Name:: Spectrochimica Acta. Part B, Atomic Spectroscopy

Additional Journal Information:: Journal Volume: 159; Journal Issue: C; Journal ID: ISSN 0584-8547

Publisher:: Elsevier

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

Subject:: 73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS; Uranium; Surface damage; hydrogen embrittlement; Hydride corrosion; Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy; Hand-held LIBS; 36 MATERIALS SCIENCE

Citation Formats


                    Garlea, Elena, Bennett, B. N., Martin, Madhavi Z., Bridges, R. L., Powell, G. L., and Leckey, John H. Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium.  United States: N. p., 2019. 
Web.  doi:10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651.

Copy to clipboard


                    Garlea, Elena, Bennett, B. N., Martin, Madhavi Z., Bridges, R. L., Powell, G. L., & Leckey, John H. Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium.  United States.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651

Copy to clipboard


                    Garlea, Elena, Bennett, B. N., Martin, Madhavi Z., Bridges, R. L., Powell, G. L., and Leckey, John H. Mon .  
"Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium".  United States.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651.  https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1546542.

Copy to clipboard


                    
@article{osti_1546542,

  title        = {Novel use of a hand-held laser induced breakdown spectroscopy instrument to monitor hydride corrosion in uranium},

  author       = {Garlea, Elena and Bennett, B. N. and Martin, Madhavi Z. and Bridges, R. L. and Powell, G. L. and Leckey, John H.},

  abstractNote = {Using a compact hand-held laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) instrument, studies were conducted on specimens of uranium charged with controlled hydrogen concentrations for a qualitative evaluation of hydride corrosion. Four samples of depleted uranium with two different starting microstructures (cast and rolled) were used for this study. The hydrogen charged samples (rolled 1.8 wppm H and cast 14 wppm H by weight) are representative of the pre-corrosion states with hydrides distributed throughout the bulk. In-depth LIBS measurements were carried out, after the thick surface corrosion layer was removed, by applying 100 laser pulses from sample surface into the bulk on five different sample locations. Three additional areas on each sample were studied by laser ablation using a 12-point grid approach. The atomic emission signals of elemental uranium, carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen were identified and analyzed. All four samples showed similar uranium and carbon concentrations, as expected. Hydrogen content was consistent with each sample’s specification, such that the hydrogen charged samples exhibited higher hydrogen concentration than their references. Both specimens charged with hydrogen showed elevated oxygen content as well, due to rapid oxidation of uranium and uranium hydrides. The oxidation process was facilitated by the laser ablation and plasma plume’s high temperature effects on the sample combined with the glovebox environment. The uranium surface damage produced by laser ablation was quantitatively evaluated by optical microscopy.},

  doi          = {10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651},

  journal      = {Spectrochimica Acta. Part B, Atomic Spectroscopy},

  number       = C,

  volume       = 159,

  place        = {United States},

  year         = {Mon Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2019},

  month        = {Mon Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2019}

}

Copy to clipboard

Journal Article:

Free Publicly Available Full Text

Accepted Manuscript (Publisher)

Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Publisher's Version of Record

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.sab.2019.105651

Other availability

Search WorldCat to find libraries that may hold this journal

Citation Metrics:

Cited by: 10 works

Citation information provided by
Web of Science

Figures / Tables:

Figure 1: Optical micrographs showing the starting microstructures for a) as-rolled and b) as-cast cases; the resulting microstructures after hydrogen charging for c) rolled 1.8 wppm H and d) cast 14 wppm H samples.

All figures and tables (8 total)

Save / Share:

Export Metadata

Save to My Library

Figures / Tables found in this record:

Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.

Similar Records in DOE PAGES and OSTI.GOV collections:

Assessing the influence of microstructure on uranium hydride size distributions via small angle neutron scattering

Journal Article Harris, Zachary ; Garlea, Elena ; Boyd, Tasha ; ... - Materialia

Here, the effect of microstructure on the internal hydriding behavior of both cast (1 mm grain size) and rolled (25 μm grain size) uranium containing hydrogen concentrations between 0 and 1.8 wppm were evaluated via small angle neutron scattering (SANS). Increasing hydrogen content up to 1.8 wppm in the cast uranium only weakly affected the average uranium hydride (UH₃) precipitate size, calculated from the SANS data. Conversely, the UH₃ phase fraction was found to strongly depend on the hydrogen content in the same cast samples. A substantially reduced UH₃ particle size distribution was observed in the rolled uranium relative tomore »« less
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.mtla.2023.101737

Full Text Available
High-temperature oxidation kinetics of sponge-based E110 cladding alloy

Journal Article Yan, Yong ; Garrison, Benton E. ; Howell, Mike ; ... - Journal of Nuclear Materials

Two-sided oxidation experiments were recently conducted at 900°C–1200 °C in flowing steam with samples of sponge-based Zr-1Nb alloy E110. Although the old electrolytic E110 tubing exhibited a high degree of susceptibility to nodular corrosion and experienced breakaway oxidation rates in a relatively short time, the new sponge-based E110 demonstrated steam oxidation behavior comparable to Zircaloy-4. Sample weight gain and oxide layer thickness measurements were performed on oxidized E110 specimens and compared to oxygen pickup and oxide layer thickness calculations using the Cathcart-Pawel correlation. Our study shows that the sponge-based E110 follows the parabolic law at temperatures above 1015 °C. Atmore »« less
Cited by 9
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnucmat.2017.10.067

Full Text Available
Nondestructive hydrogen analysis of steam-oxidized Zircaloy-4 by wide-angle neutron scattering

Journal Article Yan, Yong ; Qian, Shuo ; Garrison, Ben ; ... - Journal of Nuclear Materials

In this study, a nondestructive neutron scattering method to precisely measure the hydrogen content in high-temperature steam-oxidized Zircaloy-4 cladding was developed. Zircaloy-4 cladding was used to produce hydrided specimens with hydrogen content up to ≈500 wppm. Following hydrogen charging, the hydrogen content of the hydrided specimens was measured using the vacuum hot extraction method, by which the samples with desired hydrogen concentrations were selected for the neutron study. The hydrided samples were then oxidized in steam up to ≈6.0wt. % at 1100°C. Optical microscopy shows that our hydriding procedure results in uniform distribution of circumferential hydrides across the wall thickness,more »« less
Cited by 1
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnucmat.2018.02.016

Full Text Available
Mechanical Behavior Studies of Depleted Uranium in the Presence of Hydrides

Conference Garlea, E ; Morrell, J S ; Bridges, R L ; ...

This project addresses critical issues related to aging in the presence of hydrides (UH{sub 3}) in DU and the subsequent effect on mechanical behavior. Rolled DU specimens with three different hydrogen concentrations and the as-rolled condition were studied. The texture measurements indicate that the hydrogen charging is affecting the initial as-rolled DU microstructure/texture. The macroscopic mechanical behavior suggests the existence of a threshold between the 0 wpmm H and 0.3 wppm H conditions. A VPSC simulation of the macroscopic strain-stress behavior, when taking into account only a texture effect, shows no agreement with the experiment. This suggests that the macroscopicmore »« less
Full Text Available
Influence of pre-hydriding and quench on embrittlement of E110 alloy under LOCA conditions

Conference Novikov, V. V. ; Kuznetsov, V. I. ; Fedotov, P. V. ; ...

The aims of present work were to investigate the corrosion behavior and residual ductility of pre-hydrided E110 alloy under LOCA conditions including the influence of cooling rate. The fragments of unirradiated and pre-hydrided cladding (9,5*8,33 mm with a 10 mm length) were used as samples. The claddings were made from an E110 sponge based alloy (finish polishing). The hydrogen concentration varied from 5 (as received) to 800 wppm. As a result of pre-hydriding δ- hydrides of zirconium have been formed into cladding material. Corrosion tests were carried out at temperatures 1100 and 1200 C. degrees in a steam (80 mg/s)more »« less

Similar Records