Explicit Core-Follow Simulations for a CANDU 6 Reactor Fuelled with Recovered-Uranium CANFLEX Bundles

Abstract

Recovered uranium (RU) is a by-product of many light-water reactor (LWR) fuel recycling after fission products and plutonium (Pu) have been removed from spent LWR fuel, RU is left. A fissile content in the RU of 0.9 to 1.0% makes it impossible for reuse in an LWR without re-enrichment, but CANDU reactors have a sufficiently high neutron economy to use RU as fuel. Explicit core-follow simulations were run to analyse the viability of RU as a fuel for existing CANDU 6 cores. The core follow was performed with RFSP, using WIMS- AECL lattice properties. During the core follow, channel powers and bundle powers were tracked to determine the operating envelope for RU in a CANFLEX bundle. The results show that RU fits the operating criteria of a generic CANDU 6 core and is a viable fuel option in CANDU reactors.