Development of an analytical method for the trace metallic assay of (U-Pu-Zr) alloy fuel by DC Arc AES technique

Metalic (alloy) fuels are being considered for future fast reactors as a part of the 3rd stage of the Indian Nuclear Power Programme. As compared to ceramic fuels, these have higher breeding ratios (and thus shorter doubling time) due to the higher heavy metal fraction and relatively harder spectrum. Further, with the use of alloy fuel, a pyro recycling process could be designed which is more economical than the traditional Purex process based recycle. (U-Pu-Zr) alloy is one of such alloy fuel whose CQC needs to be addressed. In this context, an analytical method was developed for the direct analysis of (U-Pu- Zr) alloy for their trace metallic contents based on DC Arc AES. Carrier distillation based DC Arc AES is a direct method for the estimation of trace metallic impurities. The present work involved the selection and optimisation of the carrier, standard composition and other experimental parameters