Purification of Zirconium Cladding Using a Chloride Volatility Process
- Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV (United States)
The goal of this work is to investigate the thermochemistry of used fuel Zr cladding component chlorides as well as their activation products and residual radionuclide metal chlorides, in order to provide the DOE-NE community with fundamental data that will support the development of a chlorination process for the separation and purification of ZrCl4. Our studies will focus on the following elements: Zr, Sn, Fe, Cr, Sb, Nb and Cs; in the following sections, the term “chloride species” is applied to the following elements: Sn, Fe, Cr, Sb, Nb and Cs. Experimental and theoretical research will focus on the characterization, reactivity and volatility of the chloride species present in the ZrCl4 obtained after chlorination of Zr cladding. The methods previously used for the purification of ZrCl4 will be reexamined and the thermochemistry of the chloride species evaluated for each of the methods. Claddings of interest include Zircaloy-4, Zircaloy-2 and Zr-Nb alloys (ZirloTM and Zr-2.5Nb). In this context, we propose five Tasks: Task 1: Computational study of the chemical form and thermochemical behavior of the chloride species produced after chlorination of Zr, Task 2: Characterization the chloride species obtained after chlorination of Zr cladding and Zr cladding components, Task 3 and Task 4: Study the thermochemical behavior of Zr cladding and Zr cladding complements in the presence of Cl2 and HCl gas, and Task 5: Laboratory scale demonstrations of the removal of the impurity chloride species from ZrCl4.
- Research Organization:
- Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas, NV (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE)
- DOE Contract Number:
- NE0008449
- OSTI ID:
- 1523197
- Report Number(s):
- 15-8111; 15-8111
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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