Design, Fabrication, and Testing of a Laboratory-Scale Voloxidation System for Removal of Tritium and Other Volatile Fission Products from Used Nuclear Fuel

摘要

Advanced nuclear fuel processing methodologies are being demonstrated at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) as part of the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) program. A coupled end-to-end (CETE) research and development (R&D) capability is being installed to provide all primary processing operations, ranging from spent fuel receipt to production of products and waste forms. This R&D capability is designed for small, laboratory-scale throughput and will permit conduct of experiments in the range of 20 kg of spent fuel per year. The head-end processing segment includes single-pin shearing, voloxidation to remove tritium from the fuel before it enters the aqueous based separations systems, cleanup of the cladding hulls for disposition, and transfer of the fuel powder to the dissolution process.