A Phased Development of Breed-and-Burn Reactors for Enhanced Nuclear Energy Sustainability

Abstract

Several options for designing fast reactors to operate in the Breed-and-Burn (B&B) mode are compared and a strategy is outlined for early introduction of B&B reactors followed by a gradual increase in the fuel utilization of such reactors. In the first phase the fast reactor core will consist of a subcritical B&B blanket driven by a relatively small critical seed. As the required discharge burnup/radiation-damage to both driver and blanket fuel had already been proven, and as the depleted uranium fueled B&B blanket could generate close to 2/3 of the core power and will have very low fuel cycle cost, the deployment of such fast reactors could start in the near future. The second phase consists of deploying self-sustaining stationary wave B&B reactors. It will require development of fuel technology that could withstand peak burnups of ~30% and peak radiation damage to the cladding of ~550 dpa. The third phase requires development of a fuel reconditioning technology that will enable using the fuel up to an average burnup of ~50%-the upper bound permitted by neutron balance considerations when most of the fission products are not separated from the fuel. The increase in the uranium ore utilization relative to that provided by contemporary power reactors is estimated to be 20, 40 and 100 folds for, respectively, phase 1, 2 and 3. The energy value of the depleted uranium stockpiles ("waste") accumulated in the US is equivalent to, when used in the B&B reactors, up to 20 centuries of the total 2010 USA supply of electricity. Therefore, a successful development of B&B reactors could provide a great measure of energy sustainability and cost stability.

Design and performance of 2D and 3D-shuffled breed-and-burn cores

“…B&B reactors come in two basic flavors: Traveling Wave Reactors (TWR) and Standing (or Stationary) Wave Reactors (SWR) (Greenspan, 2012). TWRs are long cores of static fuel with a small, enriched, ''starter'' region typically on one axial end.…”

Improved resource utilization by advanced burner reactors with breed-and-burn blankets

“…However, the maximum radiation damage that cladding materials have been exposed to so far in a fast reactor is ∼200 DPA. While waiting for the development of cladding material qualified to withstand ∼500 DPA, it was proposed (Greenspan, 2012) to start benefiting from the B&B mode of operation using a Seed-and-Blanket (S&B) core in which a subcritical breed-andburn blanket is driven by excess neutrons generated by a TRU burning seed.…”

Core design options of an ultra-long-cycle sodium cooled reactor with effective use of PWR spent fuel for sustainable energy supply

“…These excellent breeding performances under fast spectrum conditions make it possible to design the core so as to have an ultra‐long‐cycle of several tens of years with a high fuel burnup. It is for these reasons that fast reactors of this type have attracted much attention in the field of nuclear engineering . Long‐life operation of a reactor without refueling or shuffling provides several advantages .…”