Behaviors of Impurities in Liquid Sodium, (II)

The behavior of hydrogen in liquid sodium containing relatively large amounts of oxygen were investigated with the aid of the hydrogen sensor of niobium membrane. The partial pressure of the hydrogen in liquid sodium at hot zone of a cold-trapped natural circulation sodium loop was measured as functions of temperatures of the cold trap and the hot zone of the loop. It was observed that at constant cold trap temperature the partial pressure of hydrogen in sodium increases with increasing the hot zone temperature. This study also showed that, keeping the temperature of hot zone constant, a logarithmic plot of hydrogen concentration calculated from the equilibrium hydrogen partial pressure vs. the reciprocal temperature of cold trap yields a straight line whose slope is nearly equal to that on the solubility of sodium hydroxide in sodium. Finally, it was observed that the permeation of hydrogen in sodium through a niobium membrane is a process controlled by diffusion. But the permeability for hydrogen in nio...