https://doi.org/10.1051/epjn/2022029
Review Article
Spent nuclear fuel management, characterisation, and dissolution behaviour: progress and achievement from SFC and DisCo
1
SKB, Box 3091, SE-16903 Solna, Sweden
2
Nuclear Waste Management (IEK-6), Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Wilhelm-Johnen-Strasse, D-52428 Jülich, Germany
3
Amphos 21 Consulting S.L. c/Veneçuela, 103. 2nd floor, 08019 Barcelona, Spain
4
Department of Earth Sciences, University of Cambridge, Downing Street, Cambridge, CB2 3EQ, UK
5
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology – Institute for Nuclear Waste Disposal (KIT-INE), Hermann-von-Helmholtz-Platz 1, DE-76344 Eggenstein-Leopoldshafen, Germany
6
Chornobyl Research and Development Institute (ChRDI), off. 272, 6-B, Staronavodnitska Str., 01015 Kyiv, Ukraine
7
Centro de Investigaciones Energéticas, Medioambientales y Tecnológicas (CIEMAT), Avda. Complutense 40, Madrid, Spain
8
National Cooperative for the Disposal of Radioactive Waste (NAGRA), Hardstrasse 73, Postfach 280, 5430 Wettingen, Switzerland
9
Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM), Unter den Eichen 44-46, 12203 Berlin, Germany
10
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, ETSI Caminos, Calle Profesor Aranguren 3, 28040 Madrid, Spain
11
Centre for Energy Research, Konkoly-Thege Miklós Road 29-33, 1121 Budapest, Hungary
12
European Commission, Joint Research Centre (JRC), Retieseweg 111, B-2440 Geel, Belgium
13
Paul Scherrer Institute (PSI), Forschungsstrasse 111, 5232 Villigen, Switzerland
14
PreussenElektra GmbH, Tresckowstrasse 5, 30457 Hannover, Germany
15
SCK CEN Research Centre Mol, Boeretang 200, 2400 Mol, Belgium
* e-mail: anders.sjoland@skb.se
Received:
22
April
2022
Received in final form:
12
July
2022
Accepted:
22
September
2022
Published online: 21 February 2023
SFC is a work package in Eurad that investigates issues related to the properties of the spent nuclear fuel in the back-end of the nuclear fuel cycle. Decay heat, nuclide inventory, and fuel integrity (mechanical and otherwise), and not least the related uncertainties, are among the primary focal points of SFC. These have very significant importance for the safety and operational aspect of the back-end. One consequence is the operation economy of the back-end, where deeper understanding and quantification allow for significant optimization, meaning that significant parts of the costs can be reduced. In this paper, SFC is described, and examples of results are presented at about half-time of the work package, which will finish in 2024. The DisCo project started in 2017 and finished in November 2021 and was funded under the Horizon 2020 Euratom program. It investigated if the properties of modern fuel types, namely doped fuel, and MOX, cause any significant difference in the dissolution behavior of the fuel matrix compared with standard fuels. Spent nuclear fuel experiments were complemented with studies on model materials as well as the development of models describing the solid state, the dissolution process, and reactive transport in the near field. This research has improved the understanding of processes occurring at the interface between spent nuclear fuel and aqueous solution, such as redox reactions. Overall, the results show that from a long-term fuel matrix dissolution point of view, there is no significant difference between MOX fuel, Cr+Al-doped fuel, and standard fuels.
© A. Sjöland et al., Published by EDP Sciences, 2023
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.