Department of Energy could establish fuel production capabilities at Savannah River Site
Aug. 8—The Savannah River Site could be getting a new job from the U.S. Department of Energy.
The Department of Energy issued a record of decision last Wednesday that it plans to construct a versatile test reactor at the Idaho National Laboratory and that it could establish fuel production facilities for the reactor at the Idaho site, at SRS, or at both facilities.
The reactor has been in the planning stages since 2017 when a provision was included in the Nuclear Energy Innovation Capabilities Act of 2017 directing the Department of Energy to begin planning for a new fast neutron source.
Fast neutrons are highly energetic neutrons emitted during fission (the splitting of an atom) that move at speeds ranging from thousands of miles per hour to millions of miles per hour.
The United States has been without a fast neutron source since the Fast Flux Test Facility at the Department of Energy's Hanford Site and the Experimental Breeder Reactor II at the Nuclear Reactor Testing Station in Idaho were shut down in the 1990s.
The Department of Energy says that fast neutron reactors will help the United States establish a "rapid pace of nuclear innovation" and will allow for the testing of nuclear materials at 10 times the current rate.
It adds in the record of decision that fast neutron reactors have inherent safety characteristics built into their designs including requiring less nuclear fuel and the generation of less nuclear waste.
Science reported in 2019 that the reactor would produce around 300 megawatts of energy and that it would likely be cooled by liquid sodium.
The Department of Energy adds in the record of decision issued on Aug. 3 that the design calls for an initial fuel source of an alloy — a metal created by the combination of two or more metals — made up of 70% uranium, 20% plutonium and 10% zirconium.
The uranium would be enriched to include 5% of the fissile uranium-235.
Fuel used later would include those same elements in different combinations including plutonium mixed with uranium that has been enriched at different levels including uranium that's previously been used in a nuclear reactor.
"Annual heavy metal requirements would be approximately 1.8 metric tons of fuel material (between 1.3 metric tons and 1.4 metric tons of uranium and between 0.4 and 0.54 metric tons of plutonium, depending on the ratio of uranium to plutonium)," the department says in the record of decision.
It adds the uranium could be acquired from a commercial supplier or from stockpiles managed by the Department of Energy and that the plutonium not needed for the production of pits for nuclear weapons should be sufficient for the project.
SRS is one of two Department of Energy sites where pit production is planned for the 2030s. The other site is Los Alamos. There are also several tons of plutonium stored at the site that was supposed to be disposed of in the Mixed-Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility.
The record of decision includes a detailed description of how the fuel source would be created. It says a feedstock program to convert plutonium dioxide into a metal would be used followed by a process to convert the metals into fuel slugs.
"Operationally, the feedstock preparation and fuel fabrication capabilities would need to generate about 66 fuel assemblies for the initial VTR core," the department continues in the record of decision. "Thereafter, the capabilities would need to produce up to 45 fuel assemblies per year."
It adds the Department of Energy would need to establish and operate all or part of the fuel fabrication capability at either site.
The department's plan calls for the reactor to be constructed by 2026.
No timeline has been given for the selection of a fuel source for the reactor; however, the department adds in the record of decision that it would announce its selection in the Federal Register and then make it official within 30 days with another record of decision.
