Clogging properties of HEPA filter induced by loading of soot from burned glove-box panel materials

Tashiro, Shinsuke; Ono, Takuya; Amano, Yuki; Yoshida, Ryoichiro; Watanabe, Koji*; Abe, Hitoshi

Nuclear Technology, 208(10), p.1553 - 1561, 2022/10

https://doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2022.2045179

To contribute to the confinement safety evaluation of the radioactive materials in the Glove box (GB) fire accident, combustion tests with the Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) and the Polycarbonate (PC) as typical panel materials for the GB have been conducted with a relatively large scale apparatus. As the important data for evaluating confinement safety, the release ratio and the particle size distribution of the soot generated from the burned materials were obtained. Furthermore, the rise of the differential pressure (P) of the high efficiency particle air (HEPA) filter by the soot loading was also investigated. As results, the release ratio of the soot from the PC was about seven times as large as the PMMA. In addition, it was found that the behavior of the rise of the P with soot loading could be represented uniformly regardless of kinds of combustion materials by considering effect of the loading volume of the soot particle in the relatively low loading region.

Effect of nitrous acid on migration behavior of gaseous ruthenium tetroxide into liquid phase

Yoshida, Naoki; Ono, Takuya; Yoshida, Ryoichiro; Amano, Yuki; Abe, Hitoshi

JAEA-Research 2021-011, 12 Pages, 2022/01

JAEA-Research-2021-011.pdf:1.49MB

In boiling and drying accidents involving high-level liquid waste in fuel reprocessing plants, emphasis is placed on the behavior of ruthenium (Ru). Ru would form volatile species, such as ruthenium tetroxide (RuO), and could be released to the environment with coexisting gases, including nitric acid, water, or nitrogen oxides. In this study, to contribute toward safety evaluations of these types of accidents, the migration behavior of gaseous Ru into the liquid phase has been experimentally measured by simulating the condensate during an accident. The gas absorption of RuO was enhanced by increasing the nitrous acid (HNO) concentration in the liquid phase, indicating the occurrence of chemical absorption. In control experiments without HNO, the lower the temperature, the greater was the Ru recovery ratio in the liquid phase. Conversely, in experiments with HNO, the higher the temperature, the higher the recovery ratio, suggesting that the reaction involved in chemical absorption was activated at higher temperatures.

Consistent modelling of material weight loss and gas release due to pyrolysis and conducting benchmark tests of the model; A Case for glovebox panel materials such as polymethyl methacrylate

Ono, Takuya; Tashiro, Shinsuke; Amano, Yuki; Yoshida, Naoki; Yoshida, Ryoichiro; Abe, Hitoshi

PLOS ONE (Internet), 16(1), p.e0245303_1 - e0245303_16, 2021/01

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0245303

It is necessary to consider how a glove box's confinement function will be lost when evaluating the amount of radioactive material leaking from a nuclear facility during a fire. In this study, we build a model that consistently explains the weight loss of glove box materials because of heat input from a flame and accompanying generation of the pyrolysis gas. The weight loss suggests thinning of the glove box housing, and the generation of pyrolysis gas suggests the possibility of fire spreading. The target was polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA), used as the glove box panel. Thermal gravimetric tests on PMMA determined the parameters to be substituted in the Arrhenius equation for predicting the weight loss in pyrolysis. The pyrolysis process of PMMA was divided into 3 stages with activation energies of 62 kJ/mol, 250 kJ/mol, and 265 kJ/mol. Furthermore, quantifying the gas composition revealed that the composition of the pyrolysis gas released from PMMA can be approximated as 100 percent methyl methacrylate. This result suggests that the released amount of methyl methacrylate can be estimated by the Arrhenius equation. To investigate the validity of such estimation, a sealed vessel test was performed. In this test, we observed increase of the number of gas molecules during the pyrolysis as internal pressure change of the vessel. The number of gas molecules was similar to that estimated from the Arrhenius equation, and indicated the validity of our method. Moreover, we also performed the same tests on bisphenol-A-polycarbonate (PC) for comparison. In case of PC, the number of gas molecules obtained in the vessel test was higher than the estimated value.

Decomposition behavior of gaseous ruthenium tetroxide under atmospheric conditions assuming evaporation to dryness accident of high-level liquid waste

Yoshida, Naoki; Ono, Takuya; Yoshida, Ryoichiro; Amano, Yuki; Abe, Hitoshi

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 57(11), p.1256 - 1264, 2020/11

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2020.1780991

Emphasis has been placed on the behavior of ruthenium (Ru) in the evaporation to dryness accident due to the loss of cooling functions (EDLCF) of high-level liquid waste in fuel reprocessing plants. It is because Ru would form volatile compounds such as ruthenium tetroxide (RuO) and could be released into the environment with other coexisting gasses such as nitric acid (HNO), water (HO). To contribute to the safety evaluation of this accident, we experimentally evaluated the decomposition and chemical change behavior of the gaseous RuO (RuO(g)) under the various atmospheric conditions: temperature and composition of coexisting gasses. As a result, the behavior of the RuO(g) was diverse depending on the atmospheric conditions. In the experiments with the dry air or HO vapor, decomposition of RuO(g) was observed. In the experiment with the mixed gas which containing HNO, almost no decomposition of the RuO(g) was observed, and chemical form of the RuO(g) was retained.

High-rate performance of a time projection chamber for an H-dibaryon search experiment at J-PARC

Kim, S. H.*; Ichikawa, Yudai; Sako, Hiroyuki; Hasegawa, Shoichi; Hayakawa, Shuhei*; Nanamura, Takuya*; Sato, Susumu; Tanida, Kiyoshi; Yoshida, Junya; 11 of others*

Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A, 940, p.359 - 370, 2019/10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2019.06.050

New precise measurements of muonium hyperfine structure at J-PARC MUSE

Strasser, P.*; Abe, Mitsushi*; Aoki, Masaharu*; Choi, S.*; Fukao, Yoshinori*; Higashi, Yoshitaka*; Higuchi, Takashi*; Iinuma, Hiromi*; Ikedo, Yutaka*; Ishida, Katsuhiko*; et al.

EPJ Web of Conferences, 198, p.00003_1 - 00003_8, 2019/01

https://doi.org/10.1051/epjconf/201919800003

Migration behavior of gaseous ruthenium tetroxide under boiling and drying accident condition in reprocessing plant

Yoshida, Naoki; Ono, Takuya; Amano, Yuki; Abe, Hitoshi

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 55(6), p.599 - 604, 2018/06

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2018.1428121

In the boiling and drying accident of high-level liquid waste in the fuel reprocessing plant, behavior of ruthenium (Ru) has attracted much attention because Ru could form volatile compounds such as ruthenium tetroxide (RuO) and could be released into the environment. To contribute towards safety evaluation of this accident, the migration behavior and the leak path factor of the gaseous ruthenium compound has been experimentally measured in this study. The experiment was proceeded by using the Ruthenium Migration Evaluating Apparatus, which partially simulates the atmospheric condition (temperature, flow rate, and composition of water vapor and gaseous nitric acid mixture) of migration pathway in the accident. Experiments with dry air and water vapor were also performed as the control experiment to discuss the effect of nitric acid. As a result, the experiment with dry air and the experiment with water vapor demonstrated that the majority of the ruthenium deposited along the migration pathway. On the other hand, the experiment with the water vapor containing gaseous nitric acid demonstrated that almost all of the ruthenium passed through the migration pathway without deposition. These results suggested that the migration behavior of gaseous ruthenium will be affected by the gas-phase composition.

A Numerical simulation method for molten material behavior in nuclear reactors

Yamashita, Susumu; Ina, Takuya; Idomura, Yasuhiro; Yoshida, Hiroyuki

Nuclear Engineering and Design, 322, p.301 - 312, 2017/10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nucengdes.2017.06.032

In recent years, significant attention has been paid to the precise determination of relocation of molten materials in reactor pressure vessels of boiling water reactors (BWRs) during severe accidents. To address this problem, we have developed a computational fluid dynamics code JUPITER, based on thermal-hydraulic equations and multi-phase simulation models. Although the Poisson solver has previously been a performance bottleneck in the JUPITER code, this is resolved by a new hybrid parallel Poisson solver, whose strong scaling is extended up to 200k cores on the K-computer. As a result of the improved computational capability, the problem size and physical models are dramatically expanded. A series of verification and validation studies are enabled, which are in agreement with previous numerical simulations and experiments. These physical and computational capabilities of JUPITER enable us to investigate molten material behaviors in reactor relevant situations.

Use of fracture filling mineral assemblages for characterizing water-rock interactions during exhumation of an accretionary complex; An Example from the Shimanto Belt, southern Kyushu Japan

Ono, Takuya; Yoshida, Hidekazu*; Metcalfe, R.*

Journal of Structural Geology, 87, p.81 - 94, 2016/06

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsg.2016.04.009

Fracture filling minerals were formed during the development of an accretionary complex. Each mineral formed under favourable geological conditions and can be used to estimate the conditions of accretion. Geological observations and analyses were made on fracture fillings from boreholes of ca. 140 m depth, in the Shimanto Belt of Kyushu. Results revealed that the minerals were formed in 5 stages distinguished by the textural relationships of the minerals. Filling minerals show that the studied rock formation has been subducted to several km depth and the temperature reached was ca. 200 - 300C. After the subduction, the rock formation uplifted and surface acidic water penetrated up to 80 m beneath the present ground surface. The acid water dissolved calcite fillings to form the present groundwater flow-paths. The results shown here imply that filling minerals can be an effective tool to evaluate the environmental changes during accretionary complex formation.

Development of a sub-MeV X-ray source via Compton backscattering

Kawase, Keigo; Kando, Masaki; Hayakawa, Takehito; Daito, Izuru; Kondo, Shuji; Homma, Takayuki; Kameshima, Takashi*; Kotaki, Hideyuki; Chen, L. M.*; Fukuda, Yuji; et al.

Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research A, 637(1, Suppl.), p.S141 - S144, 2011/05

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2010.02.042

We report the present status of the sub-MeV X-ray generation via Compton backscattering by using 150-MeV electron beam and the Nd:YAG laser. In particular, we show the result of the X-ray generation experiment and of the laser pulse compression for increasing the X-ray flux.