Electron Microprobe Examination of Metallic Fuel for Minor Actinides Transmutation in Fast Reactor

Advanced nuclear reactors and closed nuclear fuel cycles are being considered worldwide as an important option to ensure sustainable nuclear energy supplies to satisfy future demands while minimizing the long-term radiotoxicity of high level waste. Spent fuel reprocessing and the subsequent recycling of Pu as fuel and transmutation of Minor Actinides (MA) Np, Am, Cm in fast reactors are necessary steps to achieve this goal. The METAPHIX programme is a collaboration between the Central Research Institute of Electric Power Industry (CRIEPI, Japan) and the Institute for Transuranium Elements (ITU, a Joint Research Centre of the European Commission) with the support of the Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique et aux Energies Alternatives (CEA, France) devoted to the study of MA-containing fast reactor metal fuels. The final objective of this project is to investigate safety and effectiveness of a closed nuclear fuel cycle based on MA separation and irradiation in metallic fuel using a fast reactor. In this frame, three assemblies containing nine Na-bonded experimental pins of metallic alloy fuel prepared at ITU were loaded in the Phenix reactor in 2003 and irradiated for up to 11 cycles, corresponding to a maximum burn-up of ~10 at%. This paper presents results of the first Electron Probe Micro Analysis (EPMA) performed on a ternary fuel sample.

BREMIER Stephan;  POEML Philipp;  INAGAKI Kenta;  CAPRIOTTI Luca;  PAPAIOANNOU Dimitrios;  RONDINELLA Vincenzo;  OHTA Hirokazu;  OGATA T; 

2014-05-22

AMERICAN NUCLEAR SOCIETY

JRC83214

0003-018X,