CEA contribution to power plant operation with high burnup level

High level burnup in PWR leads to investigate again the choices carried out in the field of fuel management. French CEA has studied the economic importance of reshuffling technique, cycle length, discharge burnup, and non-operation period between two cycles. Power plants operators wish to work with increased length cycles of 18 months instead of 12. That leads to control problems because the core reactivity cannot be controlled with the only soluble boron: moderator temperature coefficient must be negative. With such cycles, it is necessary to use burnable poisons and for economic reasons with a low penalty in end of cycle. CEA has studied the use of Gd2O3 mixed with fuel or with inert element like Al2O3. Parametric studies of specific weights, efficacities relatively to the fuel burnup and the fuel enrichment have been carried out. Particular studies of 1 month cycles with Gd2O3 have shown the possibility to control power distribution with a very low reactivity penalty in EOC. In the same time, in the 100 MW PWR-CAP, control reactivity has been made with large use of gadolinia in parallel with soluble boron for the two first cycles