Experimental Investigation on Hydrogen Cryogenic Distillation Equipped with Package Made by ICIT

Cryogenic distillation is the back-end process used in water detritiation technologies with the aim to separate the hydrogen isotopes and concentrate it for further extraction and storage. At ICIT, research towards cryogenic distillation has been approached to develop the technology for heavy water detritiation at CANDU reactors. These results can be also useful for fusion reactors. ICIT has developed a technology for producing heavy water which was completed through a technological transfer to a heavy water plant. With this technology, ICIT has developed a research program to achieve high efficiency ordered packing for the water distillation process. These packings have been promoted at Cernavoda NPP and now equip the heavy water upgrading installations for the CANDU reactors. The packages for water distillation processes were made of phosphorous bronze, being required a very high wettability. Considering on water distillation process similarity, respectively hydrogen distillation, ICIT has started a research program for the development of similar package made by stainless steel, to be used at cryogenic distillation. This paper presents two types of ICIT packages developed for hydrogen distillation and performance data obtained on laboratory scale. In order to determine the characteristics of the package, the installation was operated in the total reflux mode, for different flow rate for the liquid. There were made several experiments considering different operating conditions.