Apologies for this pitch as it's not what this mailing list is for, but unusual measures are required due to serious time issues. Some of you may be aware that we have been developing a gas-pressure cell to ASME pressure code for a lab diffractometer rated to 300bar and 300oC for CO2 sequestration studies (so it involves corrosive conditions, brine solution, flammable gases, supercritical fluids, flooded samples, etc). Other P/T combinations and applications (H-storage, catalysis, hydrothermal synthesis, etc) should be possible to certify as long as the maximum design stresses are not exceeded. Our current CO2 cell has a max of 125bar and 200oC and is much less flexible. The current mounting design is for a D8 but it should be OK on any theta-theta system with a suitable mounting plate. If this interests you read on - if not please press the delete key A couple of things have come up this morning to make my life significantly more difficult if it wasn't bad enough already.... To date the design process has been all internal to NRC but now things have got to an advanced stage where we need external expertise to assist certification before construction, and this requires 'real' money. My institute is changing its project portfolio and drastically reducing the number of projects. I may be able to put together a funded project proposal around CO2 sequestration to keep things going, but if not, the development of the pressure stage dies here and I will be forced to move onto something else. In the absence of a real research project the only thing that may keep it going is the possibility of commercializing it, as none of the current lab diffractometer non-ambient stages comes even close in terms of gas pressure. In that event, to put this to our business office I would need some idea of the potential market for such a stage, particularly numbers of people who have the money available and motivation to buy a stage if it was on the market (i.e. without requiring approval of funding proposals, etc). After talking to Anton Paar I think it's safe to say that it's unlikely that a stage with similar capabilities will come to market from the existing companies due to regulatory difficulties and high development costs. We don't have an actual price for the stage at the moment, as the design is not finalized and consequently we haven't got a quote from the manufacturer, but as a very rough guess (so don't quote me on this) I wouldn't expect much change from $60k just for the stage itself without ancilliary bits and pieces. I may be pleasantly surprised by the final cost but maybe not as some of the materials are rather exotic. Once again, apologies for what I'd normally regard as a rather inappropriate use of the mailing list, but it's the fastest way I know of to get some feedback. I'll be leaving for the EPDIC meeting in Warsaw tomorrow afternoon and will be back in Ottawa next Wednesday (24th). I may have access to email if anyone has any serious queries. Best regards Pam 16 September 2008 Dr Pamela Whitfield CChem MRSC Energy Materials ICPET Building M12 National Research Council 1200 Montreal Road Ottawa ON K1A 0R6 Tel: (613) 998 8462 Fax: (613) 991 2384 Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
