Thermal conductivity of plutonium above room temperature

Abstract

The thermal diffusivity of plutonium metal has been measured from room temperature to 822K by the laser-flash method, and the thermal conductivity has been calculated using literature data for the other parameters. Linear fits of the conductivity to temperature have been provided for all the phases with the exception of δ′. A simple quadratic fit, suitable for rough estimates, for all the higher-temperature phases other than δ′ is also given. The results are compared with measurements of the electrical resistivity in the same region, and are discussed in terms of contemporary theories of the electronic structure of the material in its various phases.

FCRD Advanced Reactor (Transmutation) Fuels Handbook

“…They also noted that all of their data could be fitted to within an error of ~5% by a single quadratic equation. Kim et al [170] recently reviewed the thermal conductivity of Pu, and agreed with values determined by Alexander and Wood [173] to within ~10% for all phases except -Pu. The two studies apparently have no data in common.…”

“…There are few studies of the thermal conductivity or diffusivity of Pu, and almost all were published before 1980. However, in 2008, Alexander and Wood [173] reported thermal conductivities of all of the solid Pu phases based on new measurements of thermal diffusivities of two Pu samples. They determined that the thermal conductivity of each phase except -Pu (which is difficult to study because of its narrow temperature range of stability) increased approximately linearly with temperature, and that the thermal conductivity of -Pu decreased with temperature.…”

“…Recent attempts to determine the thermal conductivity of Pu have taken different approaches: Alexander and Wood [173] calculated thermal conductivity based on their new measurements of the thermal diffusivity of zone-refined Pu and heat-capacity, density, and thermal-expansion data from previous publications. In contrast, Kim et al [170] relied on older publications with thermal-conductivity values for -Pu, -Pu, and -Pu and estimated the thermal conductivity of other phases based on their electrical resistivity and Lorenz number.…”

Temperature dependence of elastic moduli of polycrystalline β plutonium

“…[24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] Elastic moduli are also one of a few thermodynamic susceptibilities which are essential for an understanding of the phases of Pu [39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49] , and with their temperature dependence are important for applications.…”

An Estimation of the Thermal Properties of Pu-Rich Metallic Fuel

“…ese values were fitted into the above equations to obtain the Nordheim coefficients c 1 and c 2 for U-Zr and U-Pu-Zr alloys as temperature-dependent linear functions. To derive these functions, we fitted the temperature dependences of the thermal conductivity of uranium, zirconium, and plutonium using the following equation from available data [29,30]:…”