Safeguards Approach for a Lab-scale ACPF (Advanced spent fuel Conditioning Process Facility) at KAERI

Year
2006
Author(s)
M.C. Miller - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Ho-Dong Kim - Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
S. Y. Lee - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Tae-Hoon Lee - Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
H.O. Menlove - Los Alamos National Laboratory
Won-Il Ko - Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
Dae-Yong Song - Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
Seong-Won Park - Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute
Abstract
The advanced spent fuel conditioning process (ACP) has been under development at KAERI since 1997 to solve the problem of the accumulation of the spent fuel. The concept is to convert the spent oxide fuel into a metallic form in a high temperature molten salt in order to reduce the heat power, volume, and radioactivity of the spent fuel. The main objective of the ACP is to treat the PWR spent fuel for a long-term storage and eventual disposal in a proliferation resistant and cost effective way. Moreover, the electrolytic reduction method of the ACP can contribute to the innovative nuclear energy system as a key technology for the preparation of the metallic fuel. Since the inactive tests of the ACP have been successfully implemented to confirm the validity of the electrolytic reduction technology, a lab-scale test will be undertaken in a couple of years to validate the concept. For this purpose, ACP project built a lab-scale facility (ACPF) in IMEF(Irradiated Material Examination Facility) basement which already has a reserved hotcell area. A safeguards system has been applied to the facility. The ACP safeguards system has many unique design specifications because of the particular characteristics of the process materials and the restrictions during a facility operation. For the material accounting system, a set of remote operation and maintenance concept has been introduced for a non-destructive assay (NDA) system. This paper summarizes the main features and the current status for developing the ACP safeguards system, and addresses a safeguards approach to the ACPF at KAERI. It is expected that a deployment of these advanced safeguards technologies would be useful for the pyroprocessing facility.