Recycled uranium as an alternative fuel material for the CANDU reactor

Reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel has been undertaken in United Kingdom, France and Japan. They are trying to reuse the recycled uranium (RU), recovered from the spent nuclear fuel by reprocessing, as a AGR or PWR fuel material. However, RU is continuously accumulating because of the shortage in demands caused by several technical issues. KAERI has conducted research works on the possible use of the existing RU as a CANDU fuel material in the cooperation of AECL, Canada, and BNFL, United Kingdom. A feasibility study was made as a first step of the work. A result of the study indicated that RU has dominated economic benefits than natural uranium(NU) such as the increase of fuel burn-up to twice, the decrease of initial fuel loading and subsequent discharge to a half. Also, in technical aspect, the accommodation of the existing reactor operation mechanism and the present fuel fabrication technology were evaluated to be mostly beneficial. Consequently, RU is expected to be used as an alternate CANDU fuel material with significant benefits in views of economics and operational efficiency. Now, the research should be focused on the demonstration of the above expectations in nuclear physics if RU and the establishment of the radiological treatment and safeguards requirement in the fabrication of the fuel with RU. (author)