Expected behavior of plutonium in the IFR fuel cycle

Conference · Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 1985

OSTI ID:5706226

Steunenberg, R K; Johnson, I

The Integral Fast Reactor (IFR) is a metal-fueled, sodium-cooled reactor that will consist initially of a U-Zr alloy core in which the enriched uranium will be replaced gradually by plutonium bred in a uranium blanket. The plutonium is concentrated to the required level by extraction from the molten blanket material with a CaCl/sub 2/-BaCl/sub 2/ salt containing MgCl/sub 2/ as an oxidant (halide slagging). The CaCl/sub 2/-BaCl/sub 2/ salt containing dissolved PuCl/sub 3/ and UCl/sub 3/ is added to the core process where fission products are removed by electrorefining, using a liquid cadmium anode, a metal cathode, and a LiCl-NaCl-CaCl/sub 2/-BaCl/sub 2/ molten salt electrolyte. The product is recovered as a metallic deposit on the cathode. The halide slagging step is operated at about 1250/sup 0/ and the electrorefining step at about 450/sup 0/C. These processes are expected to give low fission-product decontamination factors of the order of 100.

• Research Organization: Argonne National Lab., IL (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: W-31-109-ENG-38
• OSTI ID: 5706226
• Report Number(s): CONF-850610-3; ON: DE85006225
• Resource Relation: Conference: Annual meeting of the American Nuclear Society, Boston, MA, USA, 9 Jun 1985
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

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BREEDING BLANKETS
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DECONTAMINATION
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CLEANING
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