The impact of interface bonding efficiency on high-burnup spent nuclear fuel dynamic performance

On July 18, 2001, a train carrying hazardous materials derailed and caught fire in the Howard Street railroad tunnel in Baltimore, Maryland. Due to this accident, questions were raised about the performance of spent nuclear fuel transportation casks under severe fire conditions, similar to those experienced in the Baltimore tunnel fire. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) evaluates the performance of spent fuel transportation casks under accident conditions. Title 10 of the Code of Federal Regulations Part 71 section 73(c)(4), (10 CFR 71.73(c)(4)) requires that transportation packages used to ship radioactive material must be designed to resist an engulfing fire of a 30 minute duration and prevent release of radioactive material to the environment. The staff of the NRC, in cooperation with the National Transportation Safety Board, the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Pacific Northwest National Labs and the Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analysis, have undertaken an analysis to determine the thermal conditions present in the Howard Street tunnel fire, as well as analyze the effects that such a fire would have on a spent fuel transportation cask. This paper describes the analytic models used in the assessment and presents a discussion of the results.

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Improvement in Toughness of Transportation and Storage Cask Steel for Spent Nuclear Fuel

Volume 6: Materials and Fabrication ◽

10.1115/pvp2007-26530 ◽

2007 ◽

Author(s):

Hee Kyung Kwon ◽

Byoung Koo Kim ◽

Kuk Cheol Kim ◽

Keun Ho Song ◽

Jeong Tae Kim

Keyword(s):

Heat Treatment ◽

Low Temperature ◽

Nuclear Fuel ◽

Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽

Radioactive Material ◽

Low Alloy Steels ◽

Tempering Temperature ◽

Impact Properties ◽

Temperature Impact ◽

The Impact

Nuclear power plants have been operated for fifty years. Currently the managements of spent fuel are on progress vigorously. Casks for transportation and/or storage of spent nuclear fuel are usually made of SA350 low alloy steels. The wall thickness of the casks are greater than 300mm. But because leakage of nuclear fuel or radioactive material from unexpected brittle fracture is not acceptable, Nil-ductility transition temperatures of colder than −150°F are needed. The effects of chemical composition and heat treatment on low temperature impact properties of SA350 are investigated in this study. The microstructure of SA350 steel is composed of ferrite and pearlite. The variations of microstructure, low temperature impact properties and strength at room temperature with carbon, vanadium and manganese content are analyzed. To improve the low temperature impact properties, heat treatment at an temperature between quenching and tempering temperature is introduced. With the optimum combination of alloying elements and heat treatment, the impact properties can be improved down to the level of nil-ductility transition temperature −150°F.

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Long-term safety of the extended SFR - Methodology and conclusions from the SR-PSU project

MRS Advances ◽

10.1557/adv.2017.192 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 1 (61) ◽

pp. 4075-4080

Author(s):

Fredrik Vahlund

Keyword(s):

Radioactive Waste ◽

Nuclear Fuel ◽

Nuclear Power ◽

Safety Assessment ◽

Power Plants ◽

Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽

Surface System ◽

Radiological Safety ◽

The Impact

ABSTRACTSince 1988 the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co. operates a repository for low- and intermediate-level short-lived radioactive waste, SFR, in Forsmark, Sweden. Due to decommissioning of the nuclear power plants additional storage capacity is needed. In December 2014, an application to extend the repository was therefore submitted. One key component of this application was an assessment of post-closure safety of the extended SFR. For this safety assessment, a methodology based on that developed by SKB for the spent nuclear fuel repository was used and the impact of the degradation of repository components, the evolution of the surface system and changes of future climate on the radiological safety of the repository was assessed over a period of 100,000 years. The central conclusion of the SR-PSU safety assessment is that the extended SFR repository meets requirements on protection of human health and of the environment that have been established by the Swedish radiation safety authority for the final disposal of radioactive waste. Furthermore, the design of the repository was shown suitable for the waste selected and the applied methodology suitable for the safety assessment.

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The Development of Reversible Bending Fatigue Tester and Its Application to High Burnup Spent Nuclear Fuel Vibration Integrity Investigation under Normal Transportation

10.2172/1150341 ◽

2014 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Jy-An John Wang ◽

Hong Wang

Keyword(s):

Nuclear Fuel ◽

Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽

Bending Fatigue ◽

High Burnup

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A new tool for the simulation of different nuclear fleets at equilibrium

EPJ Nuclear Sciences & Technologies ◽

10.1051/epjn/2021025 ◽

2022 ◽

Vol 8 ◽

pp. 1

Author(s):

Heddy Barale ◽

Camille Laguerre ◽

Paul Sabatini ◽

Fanny Courtin ◽

Kévin Tirel ◽

...

Keyword(s):

Nuclear Fuel ◽

Nuclear Reactor ◽

Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽

Fuel Cycle ◽

Main Tool ◽

Simulation Code ◽

Simulation Tools ◽

Fuel Cycles ◽

Cycle Simulation ◽

The Impact

Scenario simulations are the main tool for studying the impact of a nuclear reactor fleet on the related fuel cycle facilities. This equilibrium preliminary study aims to present the functionalities of a new tool and to show the wide variety of reactors/cycles/strategies that can be studied in steady state conditions and validated with more details thanks to dynamic code. Different types of scenario simulation tools have been developed at CEA over the years, this study focuses on dynamic and equilibrium codes. Dynamic fuel cycle simulation code models the ingoing and outgoing material flow in all the facilities of a nuclear reactor fleet and their evolutions through the different nuclear processes over a given period of time. Equilibrium fuel cycle simulation code models advanced nuclear fuel cycles in equilibrium conditions, i.e. in conditions which stabilize selected nuclear inventories such as spent nuclear fuel constituents, plutonium or some minor actinides. The principle of this work is to analyze different nuclear reactors (PWR, AMR) and several fuel types (UOX, MOX, ERU, MIX) to simulate advanced nuclear fleet with partial and fully plutonium and uranium multi-recycling strategies at equilibrium. At this first stage, selected results are compared with COSI6 simulations in order to evaluate the precision of this new tool, showing a significant general agreement.

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Seismic stability of the survey areas of potential sites for the deep geological repository of the spent nuclear fuel

Open Physics ◽

10.1515/phys-2017-0055 ◽

2017 ◽

Vol 15 (1) ◽

pp. 486-493

Author(s):

Zdeněk Kaláb ◽

Jan Šílený ◽

Markéta Lednická

Keyword(s):

Czech Republic ◽

Nuclear Fuel ◽

Spent Nuclear Fuel ◽

Probabilistic Method ◽

Seismic Stability ◽

Historical Period ◽

Deep Geological Repository ◽

The Czech Republic ◽

Geological Repository ◽

The Impact

AbstractThis paper deals with the seismic stability of the survey areas of potential sites for the deep geological repository of the spent nuclear fuel in the Czech Republic. The basic source of data for historical earthquakes up to 1990 was the seismic website [10]. The most intense earthquake described occurred on September 15, 1590 in the Niederroesterreich region (Austria) in the historical period; its reported intensity is Io = 8-9. The source of the contemporary seismic data for the period since 1991 to the end of 2014 was the website [11]. It may be stated based on the databases and literature review that in the period from 1900, no earthquake exceeding magnitude 5.1 originated in the territory of the Czech Republic.In order to evaluate seismicity and to assess the impact of seismic effects at depths of hypothetical deep geological repository for the next time period, the neo-deterministic method was selected as an extension of the probabilistic method. Each one out of the seven survey areas were assessed by the neo-deterministic evaluation of the seismic wave-field excited by selected individual events and determining the maximum loading.Results of seismological databases studies and neo-deterministic analysis of Čihadlo locality are presented.

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