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Russian fuel company TVEL (part of Rosatom) has developed a unified technological process for the manufacture of fuel assemblies for mixed dense uranium-plutonium nitride SNUP fuel using a complex of experimental facilities at TVEL’s Siberian Chemical Combine (SCC) in Seversk. The technology was developed by the AA Bochvar Research Institute of Inorganic Materials (VNIINM - part of TVEL).

SNUP fuel for fast neutron reactors is being developed and tested as part of the Proryv (Breakthrough) strategic industry project, which is aimed at creating a new nuclear power platform with a closed nuclear fuel cycle. The innovative lead-cooled fast neutron reactor BREST-OD-300 being built at SCC as part of the Pilot and Demonstration Energy Complex (ODEK will operate on SNUP fuel.

The complex of experimental facilities at SCC was designed as a prototype to test the technology for the production lines being installed at the fuel fabrication module at ODEK. The technological process for the production of SNUP fuel at the SCC experimental site of the SCC has to date manufactured fuel assemblies that are being tested in the BN-600 fast reactor at unit 3 of the Beloyarsk NPP. It will also form the basis of a similar process for fabricating standard fuel assemblies for the future BREST-OD-300 reactor.

“The facility can be used for the manufacture of both SNUP and mox and Remix fuel on an experimental and pilot scale,” said Mikhail Skupov, VNIINM Deputy General Director, Director of the Research and Design and Technology Department for the Development of Fuel Rods for Fast and Gas Reactors.

Image courtesy of Rosatom

Date: Friday, 22 July 2022
Original article: neimagazine.com/news/newsrussia-develops-experimental-complex-for-testing-innovative-fuels-9866995