2006 International RERTR Meeting

Abstracts and Available Papers Presented at the Meeting

Post Irradiation Examination of Monolithic Mini fuel Plates from RERTR-6

M.R. FINLAY
On Assignment at the ANL/INL from the
Australian Nuclear Science & Technology Organisation, PMB 1, Menai, NSW, 2234,
AUSTRALIA

D.M. WACHS
Idaho National Laboratory, P.O. Box 1625, Idaho Falls, ID 83415, USA

G. L. HOFMAN
Argonne National Laboratory, 9700 S. Cass Ave., Argonne, IL 60439, USA

ABSTRACT

The requirement to convert the high power research reactors cannot be achieved with standard dispersion fuels. It is only possible to achieve the necessary power densities by the replacement of the traditional fuel/dispersant meat with a solid fuel. The solid fuel in the form of a foil has come to be known as 'monolithic fuel'. The idea to use a solid foil was based, at least in part, on the extensive reaction that occurs between UMo fuel and the aluminium matrix which plagued the early UMo irradiation tests.

A monolithic fuel, in the form of a 12 mm diameter UMo disk was first irradiated in RERTR-4 with promising results. Based on that success and the requirements of the high power reactors, significant effort has been devoted to the development of fabrication of mini-plates containing foils. The RERTR-6 experiment was the first irradiation of monolithic fuel where the foil occupied the full fuel meat volume in the mini-plate. RERTR-6 contained 10 monolithic mini-plates fabricated by Friction Stir Welding (FSW), that were irradiated at moderate power density to moderate burn-up.

In this paper non-destructive and destructive post-irradiation examination results of those monolithic mini-plates are presented. The results are encouraging and suggest that the qualification of this type of fuel is possible.

 

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