Design and Testing of an Advanced Portable Tritium Getter Bed

This paper presents the design and first tests of a portable uranium getter bed where the drawbacks of the standard available transport getters have been either mitigated or eliminated. The heating of the bed is made internally, ie, heating the uranium by a close contact of the heater element with the material, therefore reducing the temperature of the wall that is shielded from the heat source. Keeping the wall relatively cold reduces the tritium losses by permeation and the heat load to the glovebox. With this design the maximum operating temperature of the external wall is ≈ 373 K, this corresponds to a nominal reduction in permeation of four orders of magnitude.