ML21145A259

Advanced Reactors GEIS Docs - Inl - Inl Haleu Capabilities

ML21145A259
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Issue date:	05/25/2021
From:	NRC
To:	NRC/NMSS/DREFS
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From: Giacinto, Joseph Sent: Tuesday, May 25, 2021 2:05 PM To: AdvancedReactors-GEISDocsPEm Resource

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INL - INL HALEU Capabilities Attachments: Todd 2020 INL_Capabilities.pdf

INL HALEU Capabilities Terry Todd, Laboratory Fellow NEI/GAIN/EPRI HALEU Video Workshop April 28, 2020

Outline

• EBR-II metal uranium product

- Recast- metal product

- Small-scale polishing- oxide product

• Aluminum or Zirconium clad HEU fuels

- Headend treatment (ZIRCEX)

- Processing (pilot-scale and engineering-scale) 2

EBR-II Driver fuel processing Electrorefined uranium dendrite product Cast uranium product 3 ingot 3

Pyroprocessing - EBR II Driver Fuel Spent Driver Electrorefined Uranium Ingot

HALEU EBR-II Metal Feedstock Progress

• HALEU as metal from EBR-II is the nearest term feedstock available to support fast-spectrum advanced reactor concepts

• Processing of EBR-II driver fuel will continue until all driver fuel is processed

• Production of EBR-II HALEU reguli will continue until all EBR-II driver fuel has been treated

- Operations ramp up to 7 day/wk, 12 hr/day

- 0.365 MT produced in 2019

- 2nd furnace available 2020 - 1 MT/year

- 5 MT forecast to be available by 2024 Recovered U metal Large metallic ingot New graphite crucible Low dose rate, small size Novel Multi-function furnace HALEU metal regulus 5

HALEU EBR-II Oxide Feedstock Demonstration

• Polished EBR-II uranium product suitable for thermal spectrum reactors

• Demonstrated U Polishing in small-scale equipment (using equipment on-hand)

- Dissolution of EBR II uranium metal regulus

- Uranium purification from residual fission products by solvent extraction

- Precipitation of uranium using peroxide process

- Uranium oxide produced by calcination Uranyl Peroxide Uranium Oxide Low dose rate, small size Uranium Trioxide HALEU metal regulus U metal dissolution U purification 6

U metal regulus Uranyl Peroxide - UO2(O2).4H2O UO2 pellets EBR-II oxide product characteristics

• All metal species except uranium were below analytical detection limits

• Uranium isotopic analysis (same as metal)

- U-235: 19.77%

- U-238: 79.5 %

- U-234: 0.18%

- U-236: 0.55 %

• Dose rates (theoretical dose for unirradiated 20% U-235 HALEU) 8

Dry headend for zirconium or aluminum clad fuels 9

ZIRCEX Headend Progress

• Pilot plant operational on October 3, 2019

• Zirconium decladding testing initiated (10 completed runs to date)

• 2020 test schedule to include Zr and Al

• Receipt of unirradiated HEU fuel elements was completed in November 2019 Instantaneous and overall reaction rate with HCl gas and zirconium Zirconium sample after dry ZIRCEX decladding process Simulated Zircaloy-2 clad fuel

Process scale-up

• Design of pilot-scale processing glove box line for clean or lightly irradiated materials - in progress

- Dissolution/solvent extraction/

conversion/waste vitrification

• EBR-II product (19.7% HALEU)

• ZIRCEX pilot plant product (unirradiated HEU)

• Other fuel/orphan materials

• Engineering-scale demonstration conceptual design in progress

• Projected 1-2 MT/yr of HALEU based on EBR-II and ATR recycled fuels 11

Projected INL HALEU Production Rates HALEU Production 2

1.8 1.6 1.4 1.2 HALEU (MT) 1 0.8 0.6 0.4 0.2 0

2020 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 2026 2027 2028 2029 2030 2031 2032 2033 2034 2035 Year EBR II Production HZD Production 12

2021 - Planned Activities

• EBR-II

- Continue processing EBR-II driver fuel

- Continue to recast previously processed EBR-II uranium product into reguli

- A total of 1 MT of HALEU reguli will be produced per year

• ZIRCEX

- Complete testing of Zr and Al simulated fuels

- Initiate testing of unirradiated HEU fuel

- Complete design of pilot-scale glovebox line for polishing EBR-II product and ZIRCEX HEU product

- Complete conceptual design of Hybrid-ZIRCEX Engineering-Scale Demonstration

- Initiate NEPA (Environmental Assessment) for Hybrid-ZIRCEX Engineering-Scale Demonstration

- Complete construction of in-can vitrification pilot plant 13