If I were to build a hot cell as depicted in the diagram below, how much could it cost just in materials and driving equipment, and what safety measures would be worth investing on with such experimentation?
Roughly speaking the outer tubular body would be about 8–10 cm high.
My suspicion is that the main difficulty and likely what could drive costs up would be having an internal cartridge heater and cables rated for the temperatures required. Thermocouples, other sensors and related controllers and loggers have been omitted in the diagram but would probably also affect costs significantly. Catalyst costs on the other hand would be minimal as long as no rare/precious elements or isotopes are used.
The optional other oxides mentioned would be for example ZrO2, TiO2, SiO2, CeO2, etc.
From past observations in semi-electrolytic experiments at low temperatures and narrow-gap electrodes, passing a current directly through the catalyst (composed of a similar material) could lower the operating temperature range to 300–350 °C, but actual feasibility with the configuration above would have to be verified in practice.