transmuted in the system and only a small amount of MA is transferred to the waste
stream. As seen in Fig. 16.8, MA recycling is necessary for higher transmutation
efficiency. It takes ten times the effective half-life to reduce the mass of MA to
1/1,000 of the initial mass. When the irradiation time of one cycle is 2.19 year, ten
fuel cycles are necessary to reduce the mass of MA to 1/1,000.
16.6 Conclusions
Transmutation by MA-hydride targets has been studied when the hydride target
assemblies are loaded in the radial blanket region of the typical fast reactor. The
MA-target pin has been designed based on experience accumulated in the development of the Hf-hydride control rod. The following conclusions have been
obtained.
1. The MA-hydride target shows an excellent performance for the transmutation of
wastes. The effective half life is 2.19 years, which is one third of that of the
MA-metal target case.
2. The MA-hydride target has advantages in lowering of peak power and increase
of loading mass in the radial blanket region.
3. The transmutation mass of MA is almost equivalent to the annual production of
MA from about three 1GWe-class LWRs.
4. After MA is irradiated for 21.9 year, a mass of MA reduces to 1/1,000 of that of
initially loaded MA. Thus, only 1/1,000 of the MA generated in a LWR should
be transferred to the waste stream.
Open Access This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution
Noncommercial License, which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in
any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
References
1. Homogeneous versus heterogeneous recycling of transuranics in fast nuclear reactors. OECD/
NEA, Paris
2. Rome M et al (1996) Use of fast reactors to burn long-life actinides, especially Am, produced
by current reactors. In: Proceedings of the Physor’96, Mito, September 16–20, 1996
3. Konashi K et al (1999) Transmutation of actinide nuclear wastes using hydride fuel target.
Trans Am Nucl Soc 81:124–125
4. Konashi K et al (2001) Development of actinide-hydride target for transmutation of nuclear
waste. In: Proceedings of the international conference on future nuclear systems (GLOBAL
‘01), Paris, September 9–13, 2001
5. Bates S et al (2009) Minor actinide recycle in sodium cooled fast reactors using heterogeneous
targets. In: Proceedings of the meeting on advances in nuclear fuel management IV (ANFM
2009), Hilton Head Island, 12–15 April, 2009
16 Enhancement of Transmutation of Minor Actinides by Hydride Target
177
stream. As seen in Fig. 16.8, MA recycling is necessary for higher transmutation
efficiency. It takes ten times the effective half-life to reduce the mass of MA to
1/1,000 of the initial mass. When the irradiation time of one cycle is 2.19 year, ten
fuel cycles are necessary to reduce the mass of MA to 1/1,000.
16.6 Conclusions
Transmutation by MA-hydride targets has been studied when the hydride target
assemblies are loaded in the radial blanket region of the typical fast reactor. The
MA-target pin has been designed based on experience accumulated in the development of the Hf-hydride control rod. The following conclusions have been
obtained.
1. The MA-hydride target shows an excellent performance for the transmutation of
wastes. The effective half life is 2.19 years, which is one third of that of the
MA-metal target case.
2. The MA-hydride target has advantages in lowering of peak power and increase
of loading mass in the radial blanket region.
3. The transmutation mass of MA is almost equivalent to the annual production of
MA from about three 1GWe-class LWRs.
4. After MA is irradiated for 21.9 year, a mass of MA reduces to 1/1,000 of that of
initially loaded MA. Thus, only 1/1,000 of the MA generated in a LWR should
be transferred to the waste stream.
Open Access This chapter is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution
Noncommercial License, which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in
any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
References
1. Homogeneous versus heterogeneous recycling of transuranics in fast nuclear reactors. OECD/
NEA, Paris
2. Rome M et al (1996) Use of fast reactors to burn long-life actinides, especially Am, produced
by current reactors. In: Proceedings of the Physor’96, Mito, September 16–20, 1996
3. Konashi K et al (1999) Transmutation of actinide nuclear wastes using hydride fuel target.
Trans Am Nucl Soc 81:124–125
4. Konashi K et al (2001) Development of actinide-hydride target for transmutation of nuclear
waste. In: Proceedings of the international conference on future nuclear systems (GLOBAL
‘01), Paris, September 9–13, 2001
5. Bates S et al (2009) Minor actinide recycle in sodium cooled fast reactors using heterogeneous
targets. In: Proceedings of the meeting on advances in nuclear fuel management IV (ANFM
2009), Hilton Head Island, 12–15 April, 2009
16 Enhancement of Transmutation of Minor Actinides by Hydride Target
177