DUPIC Fuel Fabrication in Shielded Facilities in Korea

Abstract

The DUPIC(Direct use of spent PWR fuel in CANDU reactors) fuel cycle is to directly refabricate the CANDU fuel from spent PWR fuel materials by thermal and mechanical processes without wet reprocessing process. The concept was proposed and termed DUPIC in joint research program between the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute(KAERI), Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) and the US Departments of State in 1992. The DUPIC fuel cycle has many advantages over direct disposal or wet reprocessing and MOX fuel cycle in terms of proliferation resistance, reduction of spent fuel accumulation and uranium resource utilization, etc. Since the material in the DUPIC fuel fabrication process is highly radioactive due to no separation of uranium, plutonium and fission products, which is an intrinsic characteristic of the DUPIC process, all fabrication and characterization processes should be performed remotely in highly shielded hot cell facilities. KAERI has developed the remote fuel fabrication equipment and has successfully completed the installation of them in the shielded facilities, called DFDF(DUPIC Fuel Development Facility), at KAERI in early 2000. Based on the fuel fabrication technologies, including powder treatment, pelletizing and laser welding, KAERI has successfully fabricated DUPIC fuel pellets and elements with various design specifications to evaluate the performance of DUPIC fuel through irradiation tests at the HANARO research reactor. This paper describes KAERI's progress in DUPIC fuel fabrication.