Inspection of Extruded Aluminium components in Special Nuclear Materials Storage Facilities

The UK's stock of plutonium is stored in stainless steel containers within secure storage facilities. In one such facility the packages are stored horizontally on rails within aluminium storage tubes which act as the secondary containment barrier separating the packages from the external cooling air. The integrity of the aluminium tubes needs to be satisfactorily demonstrated so that operational lifetime assumptions can be underpinned. This project seeks to identify and develop a method of inspecting the aluminium storage tubes. In addition the research will also consider methods for remote deployment of the non-destructive evaluation (NDE) technique since access to the storage environment is restricted.

The project will investigate several NDE techniques, including ultrasound (primarily using electromagnetic acoustic transducers (EMATs)), eddy current inspection, and thermography. The techniques chosen will fit any access requirements, and will be assessed and developed for identifying and quantifying any integrity issues which may be present. By using several techniques it is possible to use data fusion to obtain a more reliable measure of any defects. The project will initially run alongside a two-year project funded by the EPSRC-funded Research Centre for Non-Destructive Evaluation (RCNDE), which is investigating implementation of EMATs onto robotic crawlers, in collaboration with researchers at the University of Strathclyde. There is the potential to extend this to carry other payloads.

The ultrasound group works closely with industry through the Centre for Industrial Ultrasonics (CIU) based at Warwick, and RCNDE. Joe will present research results to industry through their meetings, as well as preparing work for publication in journals such as Applied Physics Letters and NDT & E International, subject to approval of results being in the public domain. As part of the 4-year funded iCASE project Joe will be expected to spend at least 3 months at NNL and or Sellafield Ltd, which will give him the opportunity to experience research in an industrial environment, and see the conditions in which the developed techniques will work.