New Fuel Assemblies for Advanced Nuclear Technologies
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Manchester
Department Name: Mechanical Aerospace and Civil Eng
Abstract
Meeting the growing energy demand from an increasing population, whilst addressing the depletion of fossil fuels and reducing greenhouse gases is the one of the grandest scale challenges of the 21st century. Currently, around 15% of the world's electricity is generated by nuclear fission energy, the largest supply by any non-greenhouse gas emitting resource and it will be critical to the country's energy mix if the UK is to meet its goal of net zero carbon emissions by 2050 as evidenced by the construction the UKs first nuclear power plant in two decades at Hinkley point C. However, new materials are being developed to improve the intrinsic safety of current nuclear reactors and for deployment in future nuclear power plant technologies.
The fuel materials to be studied in this project include uranium silicide, nitride and boride and cladding materials, silicon carbide, zirconium carbide and zirconium nitride will be studied to asses their feasibility for use in current and next generation nuclear power plants by using ion beam irradiation to mimic the conditions of a nuclear reactor and performed an in-depth characterisation of the materials post irradiation. These novel fuel materials are strong candidates to replace current uranium oxide fuel assemblies due to their much higher thermal conductivity, which will reduce fuel temperatures and buy vital time in an accident scenario, such as Fukushima like accident. The cladding materials also have much higher melting temperature than the currently used Zr alloy in water cooled reactors and so would delay or even mitigate meltdown scenarios. If these materials can prove themselves in current nuclear reactors for these reasons, they will also be promising for deployment in next generation nuclear power plants which will operate at much higher temperatures and under more extreme radiation damage.
Radiation damage from neutron bombardment causes atomic displacement which leads to defects in materials that can evolve as a function of temperature. In addition to this build-up of defects, gases (such as hydrogen and helium) can accumulate from transmutation reactions. These gases interact with the defects formed and can further degrade the mechanical and thermophysical properties. Research into the effects of radiation damage on the properties of these advanced non-oxide ceramics are in their infancy and will need to be better understood before the materials can be developed further and eventually deployed.
This project will use facilities at the Nuclear Fuel Centre for Excellence and the Dalton Cumbria Facility (DCF) based withing the Henry Royce Institute to manufacture, irradiate and perform micro and nano-structural characterisation of the materials post irradiation. Thermal analysis of the materials will then be performed at project partners at the University of Oxford and The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) will answer the key question - what effect does radiation damage have on the superior thermal conductivity of these materials and do they fall to levels below which developing these new materials becomes uneconomical? Finally, from the highly detailed understanding of the effect of radiation damage on their micro and nano-structure, can we reverse engineer these materials
The fuel materials to be studied in this project include uranium silicide, nitride and boride and cladding materials, silicon carbide, zirconium carbide and zirconium nitride will be studied to asses their feasibility for use in current and next generation nuclear power plants by using ion beam irradiation to mimic the conditions of a nuclear reactor and performed an in-depth characterisation of the materials post irradiation. These novel fuel materials are strong candidates to replace current uranium oxide fuel assemblies due to their much higher thermal conductivity, which will reduce fuel temperatures and buy vital time in an accident scenario, such as Fukushima like accident. The cladding materials also have much higher melting temperature than the currently used Zr alloy in water cooled reactors and so would delay or even mitigate meltdown scenarios. If these materials can prove themselves in current nuclear reactors for these reasons, they will also be promising for deployment in next generation nuclear power plants which will operate at much higher temperatures and under more extreme radiation damage.
Radiation damage from neutron bombardment causes atomic displacement which leads to defects in materials that can evolve as a function of temperature. In addition to this build-up of defects, gases (such as hydrogen and helium) can accumulate from transmutation reactions. These gases interact with the defects formed and can further degrade the mechanical and thermophysical properties. Research into the effects of radiation damage on the properties of these advanced non-oxide ceramics are in their infancy and will need to be better understood before the materials can be developed further and eventually deployed.
This project will use facilities at the Nuclear Fuel Centre for Excellence and the Dalton Cumbria Facility (DCF) based withing the Henry Royce Institute to manufacture, irradiate and perform micro and nano-structural characterisation of the materials post irradiation. Thermal analysis of the materials will then be performed at project partners at the University of Oxford and The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) will answer the key question - what effect does radiation damage have on the superior thermal conductivity of these materials and do they fall to levels below which developing these new materials becomes uneconomical? Finally, from the highly detailed understanding of the effect of radiation damage on their micro and nano-structure, can we reverse engineer these materials
Organisations
- University of Manchester (Fellow, Lead Research Organisation)
- UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD (Collaboration)
- BANGOR UNIVERSITY (Collaboration)
- National Nuclear Laboratory (Collaboration, Project Partner)
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Collaboration, Project Partner)
- Belgian Nuclear Research Centre (Project Partner)
- University of Oxford (Project Partner)
- Bangor University (Project Partner)
- University of Leeds (Project Partner)
Publications
Townsend LT
(2021)
Sulfidation of magnetite with incorporated uranium.
in Chemosphere
Harrison R
(2021)
Spark plasma sintering of (U,Ce)O2 as a MOx nuclear fuel surrogate
in Journal of Nuclear Materials
Worth R
(2022)
Oxidation of U3Si2: The role of exothermic energy
in Journal of Nuclear Materials
Zagyva T
(2023)
Microstructure and radiation tolerance of molybdenum-rich glass composite nuclear waste forms
in Journal of Nuclear Materials
Zagyva T
(2023)
In situ TEM study of heavy-ion irradiation-induced amorphisation and electron beam-induced recrystallisation in powellite (CaMoO4)
in Acta Materialia
Foster C
(2022)
Hydrotalcite Colloidal Stability and Interactions with Uranium(VI) at Neutral to Alkaline pH.
in Langmuir : the ACS journal of surfaces and colloids
Dunn S
(2024)
HAXPES reference spectra of UO2 generated with Ga Ka x-ray source
in Surface Science Spectra
Harrison R
(2022)
Development and comparison of field assisted sintering techniques to densify CeO2 ceramics
in Journal of the European Ceramic Society
Koç Ö
(2024)
A spatially resolved analysis of dislocation loop and nanohardness evolution in proton irradiated Zircaloys
in Acta Materialia
Description | ESA Flash sintering RTGs |
Amount | £150,081 (GBP) |
Organisation | National Nuclear Laboratory |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2022 |
End | 08/2023 |
Description | Bangor University |
Organisation | Bangor University |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | UoM provide empirical data to Bangor University for modelling as well as access to research project materials results etc. |
Collaborator Contribution | Bangor provide academic time to NuFAN steering group committee and in-kind modelling simualtion |
Impact | Collaborative meetings at steering group but no common outputs to date yet. |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | MIT |
Organisation | Massachusetts Institute of Technology |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Access to ion irradiated materials and secondments of PI to MIT in ~2024 to undertake experiments on ion irradiated uranium materials |
Collaborator Contribution | Attendance at steering group committees and feedback on projects results to date and planning of experiments on thermal measurements to be undertaken at MIT ~2024 on uranium active samples |
Impact | Attendance at steering group committees and feedback on projects results to date and planning of experiments on thermal measurements to be undertaken at MIT ~2024 on uranium active samples. No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | NNL |
Organisation | National Nuclear Laboratory |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Access to research data and results from the project to date |
Collaborator Contribution | Attendance at steering group committees and feedback on projects results to date |
Impact | Attendance at steering group committees and feedback on projects results to date |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | University of Oxford |
Organisation | University of Oxford |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Research partnership to examine the surface measurements of ion beam irradiation induced changes in thermal properties and validation against neutron irradiated data. |
Collaborator Contribution | Undertaken work to develop PDRA at UoM and make measurements of samples |
Impact | No outputs or outcomes yet from partnership |
Start Year | 2023 |
Description | Ion beam workshop |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | The event was a 2 day workshop on best practice on the use of ion beams for irradiation damage in materials and characterisation techniques hosted by the PI in the Henry Royce Hub building (UK centre for advanced materials) at UoM. The workshop brought together speakers from industry NNL, UKAEA and academia, UoM, University of Sheffield and Huddersfield. There was 80 attendees to the workshop from a range of backgrounds, both industry and academic and career stages, PhD, Post-doctoral, early career and established. The event also sparked lots of discussion and feedback was every positive on the best practice that was developed at the workshop and resulted in the publication of several how to guides on the Royce website which will provide a ongoing resource for users going forwards. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://www.royce.ac.uk/events/royce-training-ion-beam-irradiation-and-characterisation-best-practic... |
Description | NuMAT conference presentation |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Other audiences |
Results and Impact | Presented results at the nuclear materials research conference (NuMAT) in Ghent, Belgium 2022 |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Outreach at Sale high school Manchester |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Local |
Primary Audience | Schools |
Results and Impact | 200 year 6 six students attended an assembly on careers in STEM where the PI presented with another engineer from Industry on engineering challenges to address Net-Zero. This consisted of a presentation of videos, activities and other engagement actives to get the students to understand where our energy comes from and the consequences of such sources as well as discuss what it is to be an engineer/scientist. The event was organised via the STEM ambassador scheme and the teacher who organised the event reported a high amount of engagement after the day with students discussing more about the range of careers available in STEM subjects. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |