THE PRELIMINARY PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS OF THE TRANSMUTATION FUEL FOR HYPER
A U-TRU-(40-60)Zr metallic fuel is being considered as the transmutation fuel for HYPER in Korea. U-TRU-15Zr is also considered as the reference fuel for a critical system. The MACSIS-H for an metallic fuel is being developed as a steady-state performance computer code. The fuel temperature calculation schemes were developed and implemented into the MACSIS-H code to analyze the fuel rod performance. A constituent migration subroutine has been made and installed into the MACSIS-H code to simulate the constituent redistribution. The He production rates calculated by other code were inserted into the swelling/FGR routine of the code. The burnup limits and CDF (cumulative damage fraction) were analyzed by the MACSIS-H code. There are lots of uncertainties in the modelling, so some experimental tests are needed for clarifying the uncertainties of the fuel modeling.
A TRU-Zr Metal-Fuel Sodium-Cooled Fast Subcritical Advanced Burner Reactor
The design concept of a subcritical advanced burner reactor (SABR) is described. SABR is fueled with transuranics (TRUs) discharged from thermal reactors cast into a TRU-Zr metal fuel pin and is cooled with sodium. The reactor operates subcritical to achieve a deep-burn four-batch fuel cycle that fissions 25% of the TRU in an 8.2-yr residence time, limited by radiation damage accumulation (200 displacements per atom) in the oxygen dispersion strengthened clad and structure. The annual TRU fission rate in SABR [3000 MW(thermal)] is comparable to the annual TRU discharge of three to five 1000-MW(electric) light water reactors, depending on the plant capacity factor of SABR. A tokamak D-T fusion neutron source based on physics and technology that will be demonstrated in ITER supports the subcritical operation.
Constituent migration model for U-Pu-Zr metallic fast reactor fuel
A model for constituent migration behavior in U-Pu-Zr metallic fast reactor fuel is proposed. It is based on diffusion equations for the ternary system under a radial temperature gradient, and it takes into account the alloy phase decomposition, assuming a quasi-binary U-Zr phase diagram with a constant plutonium content. Parametric simulations of Experimental Breeder Reactor II irradiation data with appropriate transport properties of the alloy system showed that the model can predict the experimentally observed radial three-zone structure and zirconium and uranium redistribution, although the predicted radial location of zirconium-depleted middle zone disagreed with the experimental result. Accumulation of basic experimental data on transport properties and a ternary phase diagram of the system are needed for a better understanding of the behavior.