Thermal Expansion of Simulated Fuels with Dissolved Fission Products in a UO2 Matrix

Abstract

As a part of the DUPIC (direct use of spent PWR fuel in CANDU reactors) fuel development program, the thermal expansion of simulated spent fuel pellets with dissolved fission products has been studied by using a thermo-mechanical analyzer (TMA) in the temperature range from 298 K to 1773 K to investigate the effects of fission products forming solid solutions in a UO 2 matrix on the thermal expansions. Simulated fuels with an equivalent burn-up of (30 to 120) GWd/tU were used in this study. The linear thermal expansions of the simulated fuel pellets were higher than that of UO 2 , and the difference between these fuel pellets and UO 2 increased monotonically with temperature. For the temperature range from 298 K to 1773 K, the values of the average linear thermal expansion coefficients for UO 2 and simulated fuels with an equivalent burn-up of (30, 60, and 120) GWd/tU are 1.19 × 10