The IFR pyroprocessing for high-level waste minimization

The process developed for the recycle of integral fast reactor (IFR) spent fuel utilizes a combination of pyrometallurgical and electrochemical methods and has been termed pyroprocessing. The process has been operated at full scale with simulated spent fuel using nonradioactive fission product elements. A comprehensive demonstration of the pyroprocessing of irradiated IFR fuel will begin later this year. Pyroprocessing involves the anodic dissolution of all the constituent elements of the IFR spent fuel and controlled electrotransport (electrorefining) to separate the actinide elements from the fission products present in the spent fuel. The process be applied to the processing of spent light water reactor (LWR) fuel as well, requiring only the addition of a reduction step to convert the LWR fuel as well, requiring only the addition of a reduction step to convert the LWR oxide fuel to metallic form and a separation step to separate uranium from the transuranic (TRU) elements. The TRU elements are then recovered by electroefining in the same manner as the actinides from the IFR high-level wastes arising from pyroprocessing are virtually free of actinides, and the volume of the wastes is minimized by the intrinsic characteristics of the processing of the processing method