Zirconium alloys for high burn-up fuel in current and advanced light water-cooled reactors
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Manchester
Department Name: Materials
Abstract
In order to improve the efficiency of modern nuclear reactors, reduce operating costs and minimise nuclear waste the fuel manufacturers together with plant operators and nuclear waste agencies are trying to develop fuel assemblies, which can operate for substantially longer times than what is currently achieved. Since Uranium-enrichment technology has progressed significantly in the last two decades it is now the fuel cladding material that limits the level of energy produced from a fuel assembly (termed burn-up by the nuclear industry). Increasing the so-called burn-up of fuel assemblies will improve the fuel economy/fuel usage of civil nuclear reactors, extend refuelling cycles (i.e. reduce the number of shutdowns for refuelling the reactor), and hence reduce the operating costs and nuclear waste. In modern nuclear reactors fuel cladding is based on zirconium alloys due to their good performance in the environment of water-cooled reactors and their transparency to neutrons. The time the cladding material can operate in such an environment (and therefore the level of energy that can be produced from a fuel assembly) is proportional to the corrosion properties. Longer lasting cladding material would require zirconium alloys with a more protective oxide layer, which would avoid any accelerated corrosion, breakaway of the oxide layer and protect against hydrogen pick-up. To date, any development in this area has been purely empirical and has not resulted in the required step change, which would allow operating the fuel assemblies to the desired burn-up. The scientific basis of this application is to address these issues by studying the influence and inter-relationships of all relevant microstructural features, local stresses, electronic defects in the oxide, in both commercial and model alloys when corrosion tested in an autoclave environment. This requires the project team to use the latest generation of analytical techniques in a coherent, interdisciplinary program. In addition our industrial partners provide access to additional specialist facilities such as autoclaves or melting facilities to produce model alloys. The key theme is to develop a mechanistic understanding of the corrosion process to enable the development of physically-based models, which will enable the design and full exploitation of alloys optimized to delay breakaway oxidation and oxidation growth. The research will be undertaken by a multi-university team, encouraging PhD students and post-doctoral research associates to form a core group of researchers who work together to exploit world-class facilities from different institutions.
Organisations
- University of Manchester (Lead Research Organisation)
- Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Co-funder)
- DSTL - JGS (Co-funder)
- National Nuclear Laboratory (Collaboration)
- AMEC (Collaboration)
- Rolls Royce Group Plc (Collaboration)
- Siemens AG (Collaboration)
- EDF Energy (United Kingdom) (Collaboration, Project Partner)
- EDF R and D (Project Partner)
- Westinghouse Electric (Sweden) (Project Partner)
- Rolls-Royce (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Serco (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- British Nuclear Fuel Limited (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
Publications
Garner A
(2015)
The effect of Sn concentration on oxide texture and microstructure formation in zirconium alloys
in Acta Materialia
Garner A
(2014)
A method for accurate texture determination of thin oxide films by glancing-angle laboratory X-ray diffraction
in Journal of Applied Crystallography
Hu J
(2015)
Identifying suboxide grains at the metal-oxide interface of a corroded Zr-1.0%Nb alloy using (S)TEM, transmission-EBSD and EELS.
in Micron (Oxford, England : 1993)
Hulme H
(2016)
An X-ray absorption near-edge structure (XANES) study of the Sn L3 edge in zirconium alloy oxide films formed during autoclave corrosion
in Corrosion Science
Platt P
(2014)
Finite element analysis of the tetragonal to monoclinic phase transformation during oxidation of zirconium alloys
in Journal of Nuclear Materials
Platt P
(2015)
Critical assessment of finite element analysis applied to metal-oxide interface roughness in oxidising zirconium alloys
in Journal of Nuclear Materials
Description | This research has greatly contributed to understanding of the corrosion behaviour of zirconium alloys. These alloys are widely used in the nuclear power industry, so being able to better understand the behaviour of the material means its lifespan can be more accurately predicted. This has significant impact on the safe, efficient and economical operation of nuclear reactors. |
Exploitation Route | As above, this project has been of great interest to nuclear fuel manufacturers and plant operators. A number of these stakeholders became closely involved on MUZIC, and even more sowith the follow-on MUZIC-2 and MUZIC-3 programmes. |
Sectors | Energy Manufacturing including Industrial Biotechology |
Description | The work of this collaborative project has had R&D impact for a number of key industrial partners and stakeholders, both in the UK and internationally. The results have been taken forward to form the basis of the 'MUZIC-2' collaboration, which in turn has led to the forthcoming 'MUZIC-2'. These collaborations again involve a number of UK/international industrial and academic partners. |
Sector | Energy |
Impact Types | Societal Economic |
Description | EDF - R&D |
Amount | £120,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | contribution to MUZIC-2 |
Organisation | EDF Energy |
Department | EDF Innovation and Research |
Sector | Private |
Country | France |
Start | 03/2013 |
End | 09/2016 |
Description | EDF - R&D |
Amount | £120,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | contribution to MUZIC-2 |
Organisation | EDF Energy |
Department | EDF Innovation and Research |
Sector | Private |
Country | France |
Start | 01/2013 |
End | 12/2016 |
Description | Rolls-Royce Plc |
Amount | £30,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | top up funding for CDT advanced metallic systems studentship |
Organisation | Rolls Royce Group Plc |
Sector | Private |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start |
Description | Rolls-Royce Plc |
Amount | £45,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | co-funding of DTA studentship |
Organisation | Rolls Royce Group Plc |
Sector | Private |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start |
Description | Rolls-Royce Plc |
Amount | £60,000 (GBP) |
Funding ID | Top up funding for CDT PhD student |
Organisation | Rolls Royce Group Plc |
Sector | Private |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start |
Description | UK-India Civil Nuclear Collaboration Phase 3 |
Amount | £491,287 (GBP) |
Funding ID | EP/M018105/1 |
Organisation | Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 03/2016 |
End | 08/2019 |
Description | AMEC |
Organisation | AMEC |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Contribution to R&D, trained future staff |
Collaborator Contribution | funding of PhD students, autoclave testing |
Impact | Phd students now working for AMEC, enhanced general understanding of their product |
Description | EDF |
Organisation | EDF Energy |
Department | EDF Innovation and Research |
Country | France |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Contribution to R&D knowledge |
Collaborator Contribution | funding of PhD students and providing access to EDF facilities |
Impact | PhD student now working for EDF, provided improved understanding of their product |
Start Year | 2007 |
Description | NNL |
Organisation | National Nuclear Laboratory |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Contribution to R&D |
Collaborator Contribution | funding of PhD student |
Impact | training of staff and PhD students now working for NNL |
Start Year | 2007 |
Description | Rolls-Royce plc |
Organisation | Rolls Royce Group Plc |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
Start Year | 2007 |
Description | Westinghouse |
Organisation | Siemens AG |
Department | Siemens Westinghouse Power Corp |
Country | United States |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | contribution to R&D knowledge |
Collaborator Contribution | top up of PhD students, fully funded PhD students and materials including irradiated materials |
Impact | Some of our PhD students now work for Westinghouse in Sweden and the USA. We also improved WH's understanding of their product. |