An assessment of the attractiveness of material associated with thorium/uranium and uranium closed fuel cycles from a safeguards perspective

Conference · Fri Jan 01 00:00:00 EST 2010

OSTI ID:1017493

Bathke, Charles Gary ^[1]; Wallace, Richard K ^[1]; Hase, Kevin R ^[1]; Sleaford, Brad W ^[2]; Ebbinghaus, Bartley B ^[2]; Collins, Brian W ^[3]; Bradley, Keith S ^[2]; Prichard, Andrew W ^[3]; Smith, Brian W ^[3]

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1. Los Alamos National Laboratory
2. LLNL
3. PNNL

This paper reports the continued evaluation of the attractiveness of materials mixtures containing special nuclear materials (SNM) associated with various proposed nuclear fuel cycles. Specifically, this paper examines two closed fuel cycles. The first fuel cycle examined is a thorium fuel cycle in which a pressurized heavy water reactor (PHWR) is fueled with mixtures of plutonium/thorium and {sup 233}U/thorium. The used fuel is then reprocessed using the THOREX process and the actinides are recycled. The second fuel cycle examined consists of conventional light water reactors (LWR) whose fuel is reprocessed for actinides that are then fed to and recycled until consumed in fast-spectrum reactors: fast reactors and accelerator driven systems (ADS). As reprocessing of LWR fuel has already been examined, this paper will focus on the reprocessing of the scheme's fast-spectrum reactors' fuel. This study will indicate what is required to render these materials as having low utility for use in nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, the results of this paper suggest that all reprocessing products evaluated so far need to be rigorously safeguarded and provided high levels of physical protection. These studies were performed at the request of the United States Department of Energy (DOE). The methodology and key findings will be presented.

• Research Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE
• DOE Contract Number: AC52-06NA25396
• OSTI ID: 1017493
• Report Number(s): LA-UR-10-03899; LA-UR-10-3899; TRN: US1103283
• Resource Relation: Conference: INMM 51st Annual Meeting ; July 11, 2010 ; Baltimore, MD
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY
98 NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT, SAFEGUARDS, AND PHYSICAL PROTECTION
ACCELERATORS
ACTINIDES
EVALUATION
FAST REACTORS
FUEL CYCLE
HEAVY WATER
MIXTURES
NUCLEAR FUELS
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
PHYSICAL PROTECTION
REPROCESSING
SAFEGUARDS
THOREX PROCESS
THORIUM
URANIUM
WATER