Storage and Getter Beds
Tritium is commonly stored bound to metal-hydride getter beds, which hold the gas safely and release it on demand while decay continues throughout.
- Storage form
- Metal-hydride getter bed
- Release
- Controlled heating
- By-product
- Helium-3 from decay
- He-3 co-product
- ~1.97 kg/yr class
Storing a gas as a solid
Rather than holding tritium as a compressed gas, storage systems commonly bind it to a metal that forms a stable hydride — a getter bed. The metal absorbs tritium at low pressure and releases it when heated, giving controllable, low-pressure storage that reduces the driving force for leaks and permeation.
Decay never stops
Even in a getter bed, tritium decays at ~5.5%/yr into helium-3. The helium-3 accumulates within the bed and must be periodically removed, and the tritium inventory must be reconciled against decay during accountancy. Storage buys flexibility, not permanence.
- Low-pressure hydride storage reduces leak and permeation driving force.
- Beds release gas on demand by controlled heating.
- Accumulated helium-3 is a recoverable by-product of storage.
- Inventory must be reconciled against continuous decay.
A by-product worth keeping
The helium-3 that grows in storage is itself a strategic isotope used in neutron detection. In the Kronos design set, helium-3 on the order of ~1.97 kg/yr is a co-product of the breeder system, and decay-generated helium-3 is part of that supply story rather than a waste stream.
Desorption on demand
The value of a getter bed is control. Because the metal binds tritium at low pressure and releases it only when heated, storage can hold large inventories with little driving force for leakage and then supply gas precisely when a downstream process calls for it. This decouples production timing from use timing without resorting to high-pressure vessels. Periodic heating cycles also serve to expel accumulated helium-3, so a single system stores tritium, meters it out, and yields a recoverable by-product — a compact illustration of why co-production and storage are naturally linked on the breeder platform.
Storage engineering for the breeder is specified to established getter-bed practice; performance figures are reported as design criteria pending FOAK operation.