NE Seminar: “Corrosion and Its Control in Liquid Lead and Molten Salt”

Date/Time
Date(s) - 01/26/2023
1:55 pm - 2:55 pm

Location
Rhines 125

Categories


Bio

Professor, Nuclear Engineering
Virginia Tech

Dr. Jinsuo Zhang has been a professor of the Nuclear Engineering program at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (known as Virginia Tech) since January 2017. He was an associate professor at The Ohio State University (OSU) from Sept. 2012 to Dec. 2016. Before that, Prof. Zhang was a staff scientist at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) from 2004 to 2012 and a postdoc research associate from 2001 to 2004.

Prof. Zhang focuses on studies of advanced used nuclear fuel reprocessing, material compatibility and materials corrosion in advanced and current nuclear reactors. Ongoing research activities in Prof. Zhang’s research team are 1) Nuclear Materials compatibility (materials corrosion, degradation and characterization, FCCI of metallic nuclear fuel), 2) Nuclear Fuel Cycle Technology, 3) Electrochemical Separation and technology development, 4) molten salt and liquid metal chemistry control.

Abstract

Liquid lead-cooled fast reactor (LFR) and molten salt reactor are two Gen. IV reactor concepts. Both liquid lead and molten salt are corrosive to most of the structural materials. However, their corrosion mechanisms are different because of their unique chemistries. For example, most of the oxides of steel components are stable in liquid lead but unstable in molten salt.

The seminar will discuss their corrosion mechanisms and the corrosion processes and then will analyze the liquid/solid interfacial interactions, including material dissolution, oxidation and liquid penetration, which results in materials corrosion and degradation. The seminar will also discuss how to mitigate corrosion by controlling the liquid chemistry through active oxygen control for liquid lead, redox potential control for molten salt and salt purification.