Feasibility of Recycling Plutonium and Minor Actinides in Light Water Reactors Using Hydride Fuel

Greenspan, E.; Todreas, Neil E.; Taiwo, T. A.

doi:10.2172/949052

Cited by 2 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…The neutronics, thermal hydraulics, safety and economics of the concept fuel have been thoroughly investigated through collaboration between University of California, Berkeley, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Westinghouse Electric Company, and Argonne National Laboratory [15]. Briefly, it was found that hydride fuels could safely operate in PWRs and BWRs having comparable or higher power density relative to typical oxide-fueled LWRs.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Irradiation effects on thermal properties of LWR hydride fuel

Terrani

Balooch

Carpenter

et al. 2017

Journal of Nuclear Materials

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Three hydride mini-fuel rods were fabricated and irradiated at the MIT nuclear reactor with a maximum burnup of 0.33% FIMA or ~5 MWd/kgU equivalent oxide fuel burnup. Fuel rods consisted of uranium-zirconium hydride (U(30wt%)ZrH1.6) pellets clad inside a LWR Zircaloy-2 tubing. The gap between the fuel and the cladding was filled with lead-bismuth eutectic alloy to eliminate the gas gap and the large temperature drop across it. Each minifuel rod was instrumented with two thermocouples with tips that are axially located halfway through the fuel centerline and cladding surface. In-pile temperature measurements enabled calculation of thermal conductivity in this fuel as a function of temperature and burnup. In-pile thermal conductivity at the beginning of test agreed well with out-of-pile measurements on unirradiated fuel and decreased rapidly with burnup.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%