Abstract

Planet is a vertical-lift assembly machine currently located at the National Criticality Experiments Research Center (NCERC) at the Nevada National Security Site. In the past, Planet resided at Technical Area-18 in Los Alamos, New Mexico, as part of the Los Alamos Critical Experiments Facility (LACEF). Following the de-inventorying of LACEF, the Planet assembly was relocated to NCERC in 2008 and became fully operational in June of 2011. The Class Foils experiment, which involves stacking highly enriched uranium foils to obtain a critical configuration, was the first critical experiment performed on Planet. As a major component of the Nuclear Criticality Safety Class taught for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Nuclear Criticality Safety Program, the Class Foils experiment allows personnel from all over the DOE complex to handle nuclear material and to complete the approach to critical safely and successfully. This paper describes the Planet vertical assembly and recent engineering upgrade and a selection of the experiments that have been performed on Planet since its transition to NCERC 10 years ago.

摘要

Planet 是一台垂直升降组装机，目前位于内华达州国家安全中心的国家临界实验研究中心 (NCERC)。过去，Planet 位于新墨西哥州洛斯阿拉莫斯的 Technical Area-18，作为洛斯阿拉莫斯关键实验设施 (LACEF) 的一部分。在 LACEF 清点库存后，Planet 组件于 2008 年搬迁至 NCERC，并于 2011 年 6 月全面投入使用。 Class Foil 实验涉及堆叠高浓缩铀箔以获得关键配置，是进行的第一个关键实验在星球上。作为为美国能源部 (DOE) 核临界安全计划教授的核临界安全课程的主要组成部分，Class Foils 实验允许来自美国能源部综合体各地的人员处理核材料并安全成功地完成临界方法。本文描述了 Planet 垂直组装和最近的工程升级以及自 10 年前过渡到 NCERC 以来在 Planet 上进行的一系列实验。