The effect of coatings on deuterium retention and permeation in aluminum 6061-T6 APT tritium production tubes

The accelerator production of tritium project will utilize spallation neutrons incident on thousands of ³He gas filled metal tubes to produce tritium by way of the exothermic ³He(n,p)³H reaction. Tritons with energies up to 192 keV and protons with energies up to 576 keV are directly implanted into the tube walls. To minimize tritium retention in the tubes and permeation into the coolant surrounding the tubes, it is desirable to have the implanted tritium migrate back to the inner surface of the tubes and rapidly recombine to be released as T₂ and HT. Aluminum alloy (Al 6061-T6) is the primary candidate material for fabrication of the tubes. Aluminum alloy samples implanted with deuterons and protons to fluences as high as 3×10²² D (and p)/m² were studied. Deuterium retention was measured by mass spectrometry during thermal desorption. Approximately 10% of the implanted deuterium was retained. Copper, nickel and anodized coatings on aluminum alloy were studied as possible methods of reducing retention and permeation of the tritium. In these experiments, the Cu and Ni coatings reduced the retention significantly, whereas retention increased in the anodized coated sample.