Development of high performance catalyst for oxidation of tritiated hydrogen and methane gases

Recovery of tritium released into a working area in a nuclear fusion plant is a key issue of safety. The catalytic oxidation of isotopic hydrogen including tritium is a conventional method for removing tritium from the air of the room. If a tritium release accident occurs in the fusion plant, large volumes of air should be processed by the air cleanup system. The system should be designed to be able to process the gas with high volumetric velocity. However, the high throughput of air causes pressure drop in the catalyst bed, which results in high load to the pumping system. In this study, and their applicability of honeycomb catalysts to the tritium recovery system was examined The honeycomb catalyst has an advantage in terms of pressure drop, which is far less than that in conventional particle-packed catalyst beds. The experiments on honeycomb catalysts such as cordierite and Al-Cr-Fe metal alloy indicate their preferable oxidizing performance. Particularly, the metal honeycomb has an advantage for hydrogen gas oxidization at room temperature because it is expected to be less affected memory effect by tritium contamination. Thus, these honeycomb catalysts are applicable to the tritiated gases recovery system with high performance.