“Advanced Nuclear Technology: Safety and Associated Benefits of Licensing Accident Tolerant Fuels for Commercial Nuclear Reactors.”
The
The subject of today's testimony is EPRI's collaborative research efforts related to
In the wake of the 2011 Fukushima accident, the priority of accelerating the research and development of
Overview of Accident Tolerant Fuel
The
Accident tolerant fuels are defined as fuels that can tolerate a loss of active cooling in the core for a longer time period than current fuel options, while maintaining and improving fuel, system, and plant performance during normal operation. The potential for
Key
. Decreased corrosion rates
. Higher melting temperatures
. Reduced hydrogen generation during postulated accidents
. Improved strength, toughness, and high temperature behavior
. Enhanced behavior to ramp more quickly for flexible power operations
. Better confinement of radioactive materials during postulated accidents
. Improved resistance to wear and foreign material damage
The
Whether
The research, development, licensing, and deployment of
EPRI has been conducting research over the past 30 years on advanced fuels seeking greater reliability, safety, and performance. During that time, EPRI has collaborated with key domestic governmental and commercial stakeholders to conduct research and development activities to inform fuel reliability, performance, cost-savings, efficiencies and safety.
In the late 1990s, EPRI created its Robust Fuel Program to assess high burnup fuels under normal reactor operations and postulated accident scenarios. This work has also informed the dry storage and transportation of high burnup fuel. In the early 2000's, the focus of EPRI's research shifted to improved fuel reliability and operational issues to reduce fuel failures.
Recently, EPRI fuel programs have focused research efforts to inform further potential safety and economic benefits of
The Potential Benefits of ATF Technologies
The early adoption of
At this stage of
. Safety benefits exist and vary among the different
. Specific
. Other accident scenarios that were modeled showed that accident tolerant fuels have the potential to provide additional coping time
EPRI is conducting a second study to build on the initial results. The current work includes additional accident scenarios, fuel cycle optimization (increased enrichment and discharge burnups) assessments, and exploration of additional benefits not previously studied. These efforts have identified three major areas of potential economic benefits that can result from more resilient
. Increased fuel reliability
. More efficient fuel cycles that could also reduce the amount of generated waste
. More robust fuel performance leading to improved operational flexibility
These potential benefits could provide plant operational performance enhancements and/or substantial cost reductions and/or plant operational performance enhancements.
Improved
Moreover, the enhanced
Innovations for Accelerated Implementation
Traditionally, qualification and licensing of new fuel designs has taken over twenty years. Innovative approaches can collect test data more rapidly and efficiently than the current paradigm of irradiation tests followed by destructive post-irradiation examinations at domestic and international hot cells. The time required to irradiate, cool down (for transportation), transport from irradiation facility to hot cell, and destructively test at the hot cell takes several years for each test. Several such tests have been carried out to demonstrate safety for new fuel licensing in the past, leading to the greater than twenty-year design-to-licensing timeframes for new fuels. Alternative advanced data collection methods could shorten this timeframe by collecting data in situ or without destructive examinations using sophisticated non-destructive techniques, which could reduce the transportation and destructive examination steps. EPRI is working to develop non-destructive examination techniques that could lead to quick data collection without the need for shipping and destructive examination.
Advanced modeling and simulation (M&S) along with new expedited experimental data collection methods through advanced sensors and non-destructive evaluation techniques could be used to provide sufficient technical information to support
The use of these new data collection and modeling tools can reduce the time and cost of introducing innovative technologies into operating nuclear plants by reducing the number of time-consuming and costly tests and demonstrations, potentially addressing one of the major hurdles in getting
Current regulations are focused and fixed to the current fuel systems which are also applicable to the near-term
Irradiation Testing Facilities
Test reactor irradiations are traditionally and important step in the development of new fuels. In the past year, the nuclear industry lost a key asset in the Halden test reactor which had been operated since 1958 at the
The
Halden had unique capabilities for real-time monitoring and testing during irradiation while simulating the operating environments of existing
Concluding Remarks
Read this original document at: https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/?a=Files.Serve&File_id=EC1F88B7-1B46-4545-8505-41B0BF56DBE2
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