Electro Refining Control System
Ktech performed the design and build of an electro-refining control system (ERCS). The ERCS will be used for pyrochemical processing, one of the critical front-end modules in plutonium pit manufacturing. Pyrochemical processing operations convert impure plutonium metal and metal oxide feeds into high purity weapons specification plutonium metal for subsequent use in plutonium foundry operations.
The electro-refining control system integrates control, display and data logging functions. The ERCS consists of four independent functional modules—furnace, electro-refining, stirrer and gantry lift. The furnace module powers a resistance furnace consisting of two 2000-watt halves using house AC power.
For the electrorefining operation, DC power of 0–5V and 0–50A is supplied to the ER cell electrodes. The ERCS also allows the cell to be run in a reverse polarity mode. The stirrer module consists of a drive motor, magnetically-coupled rotary drive, stirrer chuck, stirrer driveshaft, and stirrer paddle. The gantry lift performs three distinct functions: loss-of-power electrode extraction, routine electrode extraction, and lowering/lifting pull cans.
Ktech’s solution is built around National Instruments’ CompactRIO, an advanced reconfigurable embedded control and data acquisition platform. The platform incorporates both a real-time operating system for deterministic task execution and an embedded FPGA for high-speed parallel processing and control.
The control system unit backplane provides standard connections for power and data signals. The system includes flow indicator and temperature sensor interlocks for the water chiller, voltage regulator to control the furnace and DC power supply with reversing contacting for the ER module. A standard industrial computer and touch screen display provides the graphical user interface.
