The deadline for submission is May 1st 2023 and the winner will be announced on August 1st, 2023. The winner will be invited to Copenhagen to present the proposal and receive the award.
Participants shall submit documents, images and videos, which describe in detail a prototype manufacturing method for a pipe as shown in the drawings below. Such that the pipe best fulfils the requirements described on this page.
Introduction:
The carbon composite pipe shall be used in a system with flowing FLiNaK molten salts at 700⁰C.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FLiNaK
https://www.copenhagenatomics.com/products/salt/
The long-term purpose of this technology development is to be able to use carbon composite pipes and components with a variety of shapes for flowing molten salt inside nuclear molten salt reactors.
1st. test:
In the first instance, Copenhagen Atomics wish to test pipes with dimensions as shown in the drawings below heated inside a furnace to 700⁰C with static FLiNaK molten salt inside for a duration of 1000 hours, with a pressure of 0.5 bar inside the pipe and argon cover gas both inside and outside the pipe.
To win the competition prize you must propose a prototype manufacturing method on how the carbon composite pipe can be made to fulfil the requirements described on this page. The review committee will not test the submitted manufacturing methods in real life. The winner will be selected based on 7 selection criteria and how convincing the submitted documentation and other information is to the review committee.
Selecting the winner:
Copenhagen Atomics will set up a review committee of 5 people, who will review all applications and select the winner. The 5 reviewers have a broad selection of skills within engineering, manufacturing, carbon composites, molten salt chemistry, component testing, etc.
The review committee is not required to try the manufacturing methods described in the submitted documents, they are only required to evaluate the described prototype manufacturing process based on their own knowledge, skills and experience.
The review committee will evaluate the submitted prototype manufacturing methods, based on these 8 criteria:
Each of the 5 members of the review committee will score each proposal according to the criteria above. The winner will be the one with the highest score among the submitted documents.
The review committee reserves the right to contact the authors to clarify potential questions related to the documents and suggested manufacturing methods. This additional information will also be used in the evaluation of the submitted documents.
Below are listed a number of requirements that the review committee will keep in mind. The proposal should comment on each of the following properties:
Prototype manufacturability:
It is important that the proposed material can be used for manufacturing various shapes, meaning that e.g. machining of components from solid blocks is not a feasible solution.
Porosity and gas tightness:
It is a key requirement that the pipe can be made sufficiently gas-tight. The pipe should withstand 2 bar pressure and be left under water for one hour to record if there is any loss of pressure or bobbles.
Pressure cycling:
The carbon composite pipe is filled with static FLiNaK molten salt at 700 ⁰C it will be exposed to pressure cycling. One minute with 0.5 bar, then one minute with atmospheric pressure, then one minute with 0.5 bar and so on following a square wave pressure cycling during the 1000-hour molten salt test. The purpose is to detect fatigue, leaks and ingress into the material.
Thermal cycling:
During the 1000-hour test, the salt will be frozen 10 times inside the pipe and molten again. Thus the temperature will be lowered to below 100 ⁰C for 1 hour before it is increased to 700 ⁰C again. The temperature measurements refer to the temperature on the outside of the pipe. The temperature ramp rate is approximately 200 ⁰C per hour.
Intellectual property rights:
It is important that the review committee knows about any intellectual property rights associated with the materials or manufacturing methods. Thus you must include a chapter in your submitted documents, which evaluates the intellectual property rights situation related to the manufacturing methods, tools and materials, which you suggest using. This section should evaluate both your own rights and rights owned by others. If you receive the price you will be asked to sign a statement about IPR.
Copenhagen Atomics reserve the right to apply for IPR protection anywhere in the world, for designs and production methods on technology and products, which are related to this competition.
If you have already submitted a patent on some of this technology, then Copenhagen Atomics may be willing to license this IPR from you. But we will not negotiate such a license with you before August 1st. Thus if you do not list the cost of such licenses, we will generally put a high penalty on your suggested method due to IPR risk and unknown cost.
Neutron capture:
In the final application inside the nuclear reactor, it is important that the carbon material matrix does not capture neutrons or get damaged by neutron radiation. In general, this is achieved by avoiding atoms with high neutron capture cross sections as shown in the chart at the bottom of this page.
As can be seen below, carbon is an excellent material.
Different impurities in the materials are of great concern because they can activate the pipe material and cause certain isotopes to change to other isotopes and thus change binding energies and cause brittleness and other changes in material properties over time. The shorter the blue bar in the chart below the better.
Applicants are welcome to supply a small sample of their proposed material. This may greatly increase your chance of winning the award as it reduces uncertainty.
Salt samples and salt data:
If you have a material sample in your lab, which you wish to expose to FLiNaK salt to test compatibility we can work with you to execute this test.FLiNaK is very hygroscopic and you can only trust your material tests if they are carried out with ultra-pure FLiNaK in an inert atmosphere e.g. inside a glove box.
Copenhagen Atomics manufactures some of the highest purity FLiNaK salt and we have lots of experience in carrying out such experiments in glove boxes and other test equipment. Likely the fastest route to test results with different material samples is if you send them to Copenhagen Atomics for testing. However, we cannot promise that we will test your material between now and August 1st. If you send us the samples and engage with us, we will try our best to test the samples free of charge.
The second option is to buy salt samples from us. We generally sell ultra-pure FLiNaK salt samples in 100-gram vacuum-packed ingots at $500 per sample. If you participate in this competition we will sell such FLiNaK samples at half price.
We use glassy carbon crucibles in our lab for making and testing these high-purity molten salts. Thus it is known that glassy carbon crucibles are compatible with FLiNaK salt, however, the crucibles we have are too brittle for pressure cycling and thermal cycling and also we have not found a manufacturer who can make the pipes as described in glassy carbon.
Research collaboration:
If you are interested in research collaboration with Copenhagen Atomics after the competition ends, then please note this in your application. If you or one of your colleagues would be interested in becoming an employee at Copenhagen Atomics and part of our team, which will develop carbon composites for molten salt reactors, then do let us know. We plan to hire more than 20 people to do R&D with these materials in the next few years.
Submit an application to:
maria.thorslund@copenhagenatomics.com and write “carbon composite award” in the email subject.
You will receive a confirmation email from us when we have recorded your submission.