Plutonium Fuel Development Laboratory of Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corporation

The Second Plutonium Fuel Development Laboratory of the Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corporation, which had been under construction since 1969, has now been completed, and production of Pu fuels for both FBR and ATR commenced in Feb. 1972. The total floor space is about 9,000mm² in which are housed separate production lines for FBR and ATR (pellet preparation, pin fabrication, assembling and recovery), as well as facilities for quality control fuel storage, air conditioning and management office. The annual production capacity is 5t and 3t for ATR and FBR, respectively. Some of the production facilities were equipped to operate automatically in order to reduce the risk of human radiation exposure. Systems for criticality control and material balance are described together with an outline of the arrangement of the facilities with fully equipped alarm system. (author)