A high-flow radon removal system based on cryogenic distillation was developed and constructed to reduce radon-induced backgrounds in liquid xenon detectors for rare event searches such as XENONnT. A continuous purification of the XENONnT liquid xenon inventory of 8.4 tonnes at process flows up to 71 kg/h (200 slpm) is required to achieve a radon reduction by a factor two for radon sources inside the detector. To reach such high flows, the distillation column's design features liquid xenon inlet and outlets along with novel custom-made bath-type heat exchangers with high liquefaction capabilities. The distillation process was designed using a modification of the McCabe-Thiele approach without a bottom product extraction. The thermodynamic concept is based on a Clausius-Rankine cooling cycle with phase-changing medium, in this case the xenon itself. To drastically reduce the external cooling power requirements, an energy efficient heat pump concept was developed applying a custom-made four cylinder magnetically-coupled piston pump as compressor. The distillation system was operated at thermodynamically stable conditions at a process flow of (91±2) kg/h ((258±6) slpm), 30 % over design. With this flow, a 222Rn activity concentration <1 μBq/kg is expected inside the XENONnT detector given the measured radon source distribution.
@article{arxiv.2205.11492,
title = {Design, construction and commissioning of a high-flow radon removal system for XENONnT},
author = {M. Murra and D. Schulte and C. Huhmann and C. Weinheimer},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2205.11492},
year = {2022}
}