Development of strength evaluation method of ceramic reactor for iodine-sulfur process and hydrogen production test in Japan Atomic Energy Agency

Takegami, Hiroaki ; Noguchi, Hiroki  ; Tanaka, Nobuyuki ; Iwatsuki, Jin ; Kamiji, Yu; Kasahara, Seiji  ; Imai, Yoshiyuki  ; Terada, Atsuhiko  ; Kubo, Shinji  

Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has been conducting R&D on the thermochemical iodine-sulfur (IS) process for nuclear-powered hydrogen production. The IS process is one of the promising candidates of heat application of the high-temperature gas-cooled reactors. JAEA fabricated main chemical reactors made of industrial structural materials and confirmed their integrity in practical corrosive environments in the IS process. Based on the results of these confirmation tests, JAEA have constructed a 100 NL/h-H-scale test facility made of industrial structural materials. In this report, we succeeded in extending the hydrogen production time from 8 hours to 31 hours by developing a stable hydrogen iodide solution transfer technology in a continuous hydrogen production test. In addition, using the fracture test data of the ceramic specimen, an equation for estimating the strength of the ceramic component was developed.