ICIT, Romania

Cooling@20K

In line with a European tendering procedure the ICIT (National Research & Development Institute for Cryogenic & Isotope Separation Technologies) in Ramnicu Valcea awarded the Romanian general contractor S.C. ROMIB S.A. for the execution of the turn-key project to extend the plant capacities of the isotope separation at ICIT. For this purpose ROMIB decided to order both required helium refrigeration plants at Linde Kryotechnik AG.
The ICIT research unit was founded in 1970 to develop the heavy water production technology. The expertise acquired during this work enabled ICIT to extend and upgrade their research area towards fields which require cryogenic isotope separation methodologies. Nowadays this is one of the core activities of the institute.

The institute, located approx. 170 km North-West of Bucharest, operates various plants for the separation of tritium from heavy water systems by cryogenic distillation or hydrogen-based technologies.

As a consequence of the considerable experiences and the basis plant equipment ICIT is intimately involved in several research projects at European level and contribute significantly to the new experimental fusion reactor project ITER.
For the extension of ICIT plant capacities at Valcea Linde Kryotechnik will supply two helium refrigeration plants. Both plants will operate as independent units. One unit within the performance range of 1000 W at a helium supply temperature of 20 K and the other unit as a combined refrigeration / liquefaction plant with 200 W at a helium supply temperature of 20 K and the possibility of simultaneous production of liquid helium into a storage dewar. The first plant is used for the cooling of the distillation columns of the tritium separation plant whereas the second unit cools a cavity and provides the institute with liquid helium for various smaller experiments.

Both helium refrigeration plants are expected to be ready installed and set into operation by the beginning of the fourth quarter 2012.