Abstracts and Available Papers Presented at the
2004 International RERTR Meeting

TWENTY-FIVE YEARS SUPPORTING RERTR ACTIVITIES FROM CNEA MTR FUEL FABRICATION PLANT (ECRI)

L. Alvarez, N. Boero, J. Fabro, M. Restelli, D. Podestá, G. Rossi
Nuclear Fuels Department
Atomic Energy National Commission (CNEA)
Av. Gral. Paz 1499, (1650), San Martín, Pcia. Buenos Aires, Argentina

ABSTRACT
 

CNEA, the Atomic Energy National Commission of Argentina, has been participating in the RERTR Program effort since twenty-five years ago approximately. Most of this participation and support are related with fuel development and fuel manufacturing activities. This paper describes the contributions from CNEA fuel related facilities. They comprise R&D and manufacturing activities. R&D started in the early eighties with the development and fabrication of miniplates for the international silicide fuel qualification effort. At present the R&D activities continue with the development of fabrication techniques and procedures suitable for the manufacturing of fuel plates using the U-Mo based alloys. The above mentioned facilities include also a fuel power production plant and a facility for fuel scrap treatment. In the MTR fuel manufacturing field the contribution began with the fabrication of the fuel elements for the conversion of the Argentine RA-3 Reactor. LEU fuel elements were also produced for several reactors outside Argentina. Among them the core for the RP-0 facility in Peru, the conversion of the Iranian Reactor, the fuel for the Algerian Reactor and more recently the fuel for the MPR in Egypt. All these fuels use U3O8 as fissile material. CNEA has qualified also as fuel manufacturer of fuels bearing silicide compounds. At present CNEA fuel fabrication plant is taking the manufacture of 64 fuel elements for the ANSTO Replacement Research Reactor in Australia. As a result of the above mentioned activities more than 12000 fuel plates were fabricated and most of them have been successfully irradiated without any fuel failure reported. CNEA contribution also covered the development and fabrication of targets for radio-isotope production. Argentina has converted the production of isotopes for medical applications to LEU in 2002. Up to present more than 600 targets bearing LEU aluminide have been fabricated irradiated and processed. Very recently CNEA has also become an international supplier of targets for Mo-99 production.

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