Electrolytic Reduction of Spent Nuclear Oxide Fuel as Part of an Integral Process to Separate and Recover Actinides from Fission Products

Herrmann, Steven D.; Li, Shelly; Simpson, Michael F.; Phongikaroon, Supathorn

doi:10.1080/01496390600745602

Cited by 98 publications

(66 citation statements)

References 2 publications

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“…Reduction values as high as 99.7% have been obtained. 11 Subsequent electrorefining of the reduced metal in a standard LiClKCl electrorefiner was also demonstrated.…”

Section: Fuel Processingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electrochemical Processing of Used Nuclear Fuel

Goff¹,

Wass²,

Marsden³

et al. 2011

Nuclear Engineering and Technology

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“…Reduction values as high as 99.7% have been obtained. 11 Subsequent electrorefining of the reduced metal in a standard LiClKCl electrorefiner was also demonstrated.…”

Section: Fuel Processingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Electrochemical Processing of Used Nuclear Fuel

Goff¹,

Wass²,

Marsden³

et al. 2011

Nuclear Engineering and Technology

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“…This technique has been applied to the reduction of various metal oxides such as TiO 2 [4] [10][11][12], Cr 2 O 3 [13,14], and CeO 2 [15]. Additionally, it has been employed to reduce spent oxide fuel (mainly consisting of UO 2 ) to its metallic form in pyroprocessing technology for closed nuclear fuel cycles [16][17][18]. Pyroprocessing is a high-temperature electrochemical fuel processing technology for recycling the spent oxide fuel from light water reactors into metal fuel for fast nuclear reactors.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The electrode reactions in OR processes are well known [16][17][18][27][28][29][30][31][32]. The spent oxide fuels are used as cathodes by loading them into a permeable basket.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantitative Analysis of Oxygen Gas Exhausted from Anode through In Situ Measurement during Electrolytic Reduction

Choi

Lee

Heo

et al. 2017

Science and Technology of Nuclear Installations

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Quantitative analysis by in situ measurement of oxygen gas evolved from an anode was employed to monitor the progress of electrolytic reduction of simulated oxide fuel in a molten Li 2 O-LiCl salt. The electrolytic reduction of 0.6 kg of simulated oxide fuel was performed in 5 kg of 1.5 wt.% Li 2 O-LiCl molten salt at 650 ∘ C. Porous cylindrical pellets of simulated oxide fuel were used as the cathode by loading a stainless steel wire mesh cathode basket. A platinum plate was employed as the anode. The oxygen gas evolved from the anode was exhausted to the instrumentation for in situ measurement during electrolytic reduction. The instrumentation consisted of a mass flow controller, pump, wet gas meter, and oxygen gas sensor. The oxygen gas was successfully measured using the instrumentation in real time. The measured volume of the oxygen gas was comparable to the theoretically calculated volume generated by the charge applied to the simulated oxide fuel.

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“…Simultaneously, the oxygen ions (O 2− ) are oxidized to yield oxygen (O 2 ) gas on the platinum (Pt) anode (2O 2− → O 2 + 4e − ). The overall reaction involves the decomposition of MO 2 to M and O 2 (MO 2 = M + O 2 (g)) [9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]. Next, during the ER process, the actinides in the reduction product obtained after OR are anodically dissolved into molten LiCl-KCl salt at 500 ∘ C (M → M 3+ + 3e − ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Separation of Electrolytic Reduction Product from Stainless Steel Wire Mesh Cathode Basket via Salt Draining and Reuse of the Cathode Basket

Choi

Lee

Heo

et al. 2017

Science and Technology of Nuclear Installations

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We demonstrated that the metallic product obtained after electrolytic reduction (also called oxide reduction (OR)) can be simply separated from a stainless steel wire mesh cathode basket only by using a salt drain. First, the OR run of a simulated oxide fuel (0.6 kg/batch) was conducted in a molten Li 2 O-LiCl salt electrolyte at 650 ∘ C. The simulated oxide fuel of the porous cylindrical pellets was used as a cathode by loading a stainless steel wire mesh cathode basket. Platinum was employed as an anode. After the electrolysis, the residual salt of the cathode basket containing the reduction product was drained by placing it at gas phase above the molten salt using a holder. Then, at a room temperature, the complete separation of the reduction product from the cathode basket was achieved by inverting it without damaging or deforming the basket. Finally, the emptied cathode basket obtained after the separation was reused for the second OR run by loading a fresh simulated oxide fuel. We also succeeded in the separation of the metallic product from the reused cathode basket for the second OR run.

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Electrolytic Reduction of Spent Nuclear Oxide Fuel as Part of an Integral Process to Separate and Recover Actinides from Fission Products

Cited by 98 publications

References 2 publications

Electrochemical Processing of Used Nuclear Fuel

Electrochemical Processing of Used Nuclear Fuel

Quantitative Analysis of Oxygen Gas Exhausted from Anode through In Situ Measurement during Electrolytic Reduction

Separation of Electrolytic Reduction Product from Stainless Steel Wire Mesh Cathode Basket via Salt Draining and Reuse of the Cathode Basket

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