THE BENCH-SCALE FACILITY FOR FABRICATION OF TRISO-COATED PLUTONIUM FUELS

摘要

The program to develop the GT-MHR [1] and its coated particle fuel for disposal of excess Russian weapons plutonium is being carried out by Russian nuclear labs and industrial organizations shown in Table 1 with support from US specialists at General Atomics and Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Rosatom of Russia and the U. S. National Nuclear Security Agency each provide 50% of the funds for the program. The design of the coated particle fuel for the Gas-Turbine Modular Helium Reactor (GT-MHR) is based on rendering the excess weapons-grade plutonium useless for weapons by destroying a large fraction of the fissionable plutonium in a single pass through the reactor. This requires maintaining a high level of coating integrity and fission product retention as the fuel reaches high burnup levels.