Zirconium alloys for high burn-up fuel in current and advanced light water-cooled reactors

当前和先进的轻型水冷反应堆中用于高燃耗燃料的锆合金

基本信息

批准号：
EP/E036384/1
负责人：
Chris Grovenor
金额：
$ 78.93万
依托单位：
University of Oxford
依托单位国家：
英国
项目类别：
Research Grant
财政年份：
2007
资助国家：
英国
起止时间：
2007 至无数据
项目状态：
已结题

来源：
https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=EP%2FE036384%2F1
关键词：
Zirconium alloys burn up fuel

项目摘要

In order to improve the efficiency of modern nuclear reactors, reduce operating costs and minimise nuclear waste the fuel manufacturers together with plant operators and nuclear waste agencies are trying to develop fuel assemblies, which can operate for substantially longer times than what is currently achieved. Since Uranium-enrichment technology has progressed significantly in the last two decades it is now the fuel cladding material that limits the level of energy produced from a fuel assembly (termed burn-up by the nuclear industry). Increasing the so-called burn-up of fuel assemblies will improve the fuel economy/fuel usage of civil nuclear reactors, extend refuelling cycles (i.e. reduce the number of shutdowns for refuelling the reactor), and hence reduce the operating costs and nuclear waste. In modern nuclear reactors fuel cladding is based on zirconium alloys due to their good performance in the environment of water-cooled reactors and their transparency to neutrons. The time the cladding material can operate in such an environment (and therefore the level of energy that can be produced from a fuel assembly) is proportional to the corrosion properties. Longer lasting cladding material would require zirconium alloys with a more protective oxide layer, which would avoid any accelerated corrosion, breakaway of the oxide layer and protect against hydrogen pick-up. To date, any development in this area has been purely empirical and has not resulted in the required step change, which would allow operating the fuel assemblies to the desired burn-up. The scientific basis of this application is to address these issues by studying the influence and inter-relationships of all relevant microstructural features, local stresses, electronic defects in the oxide, in both commercial and model alloys when corrosion tested in an autoclave environment. This requires the project team to use the latest generation of analytical techniques in a coherent, interdisciplinary program. In addition our industrial partners provide access to additional specialist facilities such as autoclaves or melting facilities to produce model alloys. The key theme is to develop a mechanistic understanding of the corrosion process to enable the development of physically-based models, which will enable the design and full exploitation of alloys optimized to delay breakaway oxidation and oxidation growth. The research will be undertaken by a multi-university team, encouraging PhD students and post-doctoral research associates to form a core group of researchers who work together to exploit world-class facilities from different institutions.

为了提高现代核反应堆的效率，降低运营成本并最大程度地减少核废料，燃料制造商以及工厂运营商和核废料机构正在试图开发燃料组件，这可以比目前所能达到的时间更长的时间运行。由于铀增强技术在过去二十年中取得了显着发展，因此现在燃料覆层材料限制了燃料组件产生的能量水平（称为核工业的燃烧）。增加所谓的燃料组件燃烧将改善燃油经济性/燃料的使用，扩大加油周期（即减少加油的关闭次数），从而减少运营成本和核废料。在现代核反应堆中，燃料层基于锆合金，因为它们在水冷反应堆环境中的性能良好及其对中子的透明度。覆层材料可以在这种环境中运行的时间（因此，可以从燃料组件产生的能量水平）与腐蚀特性成正比。更长的持久覆层材料将需要具有更具保护性氧化物层的锆合金，这将避免任何加速腐蚀，氧化物层的破裂并防止氢拾取。迄今为止，该领域的任何开发都纯粹是经验的，尚未导致所需的步骤更改，这将使燃油组件将所需的燃烧运行。本应用的科学基础是通过研究在自动蒸汽环境中测试腐蚀时，在商业和模型合金中，在商业和模型合金中研究所有相关微观结构特征，局部压力，氧化物中的电子缺陷的影响和相互关系来解决这些问题。这要求项目团队在连贯的跨学科计划中使用最新一代的分析技术。此外，我们的工业合作伙伴还可以访问其他专业设施，例如高压灭菌或熔化设施，以生产模型合金。关键主题是对腐蚀过程有一种机械理解，以使基于物理的模型的开发，这将使对合金的设计和充分利用优化，以延迟断裂的氧化和氧化的生长。这项研究将由多元大学团队进行，鼓励博士生和博士后研究伙伴组成一个核心研究人员，他们共同努力利用来自不同机构的世界一流设施。