Characterisation of a multitube PERMCAT reactor in view of a technical facility for highly tritiated water processing at the Tritium Laboratory Karlsruhe

Abstract

In the frame of the design and development of the Water Detritiation System (WDS) for ITER, the TRENTA facility was installed at the Tritium Laboratory Karlsruhe (TLK). This facility allows processing up to 1.7 kg h −1 of tritiated water, it is however restricted to a maximum activity concentration of 3.7 × 10 11 Bq kg −1. Because highly tritiated water (HTW) still is an issue for fusion technology, it is necessary to develop an additional process to decontaminate the highly tritiated part of the water waste stream. In order to provide a viable solution to process tritiated water in excess of 10 13 Bq kg −1 an inactive experimental study was carried out to substantiate the design of an experimental facility based on a PERMCAT type catalytic palladium membrane reactor. A feasibility study was made to provide an outline design for an experimental plant to be used for parametric investigations with tritiated water of up to 5.2 × 10 16 Bq kg −1. In parallel to experiments with a large technical PERMCAT using D 2O and protium, a design study was made to define process steps and interfaces relevant for a technical scale experiment using a PERMCAT to decontaminate HTW at TLK.