An investigation into the isotopic separation of hydrogen in metals by pressure swing adsorption

在托卡马克设计中，目前商业聚变倾向的反应机制是氚-氚(D-T)反应。然而，氚是不稳定的，β衰变的半衰期约为12年。这意味着它需要被安全地储存，并受到仔细的监控。库勒姆聚变能源中心(CCFE)运营着一个氚处理设施，并使用铀金属床储存大约50克氚。一旦聚变运动开始，监管要求就要求严格分离和分离氚同位素。随着新的氚运动的到来，以及ITER和演示设计的发展，现在是进一步研究其他途径/材料来提高当前氚分离能力的理想时机。这个项目是对各种金属材料对氢的气体混合物进行同位素分离的能力的调查。一种称为变压吸附/解吸的技术将被用来研究分离行为，并比较各种潜在候选材料的性能。确定了每种金属的最佳压力和温度性能条件，为今后的氢同位素分离技术提出了建议。

The current reaction mechanism favoured for commercial fusion in a Tokamak design is the deuterium-tritium (D-T) reaction. However, tritium is unstable and beta decays with a ~12 year half-life. This means that it needs to be stored safely, and carefully monitored. The Culham Centre for Fusion Energy (CCFE) operates a tritium handling facility and uses a bed of uranium metal to store approximately 50g of tritium. Once, a fusion campaign is underway, the regulatory requirements dictate a strict separation and isolation of the tritium isotope. With the advent of a new tritium campaign and the development of ITER and the DEMO design, now is an ideal time to further investigate other routes/materials that might improve current tritium separation capabilities.This project is an investigation into the ability of various metallic materials to isotopically separate gaseous mixtures of hydrogen. A technique known as pressure swing adsorption/desorption will be used to investigate the separation behaviour and compare the performance of a variety of potential candidate materials. Optimum performance conditions of pressure and temperature will be determined for each metal, so that a proposition can be made for future hydrogen isotopic separation technology.