Effect of alloying elements on the tensile properties of hydrided zirconium alloys

Recent popular trends in pressurized water reactor (PWR) fuel management are to extend the cycle length and to employ the high burnup core designs for economic efficiency. So fuel cladding which have integrity at the high burnup condition is developed In fuel cladding, the charged hydrogen amount will be increased at the high burnup condition (high temperature and long cycle life). And high hydrogen concentration cause hydride embrittlement in fuel cladding. Therefore, the hydride embrittlement of cladding is one of the important factors to secure the nuclear fuel integrity. In this study, we performed the tensile test of various zirconium alloys in order to investigate the effect of alloying elements on the tensile properties of hydrided zirconium alloys