Research and development on accelerator-driven transmutation system at JAERI

Sasa, Toshinobu   ; Oigawa, Hiroyuki ; Tsujimoto, Kazufumi ; Nishihara, Kenji  ; Kikuchi, Kenji; Kurata, Yuji; Saito, Shigeru   ; Futakawa, Masatoshi  ; Umeno, Makoto*; Ouchi, Nobuo ; Arai, Yasuo; Minato, Kazuo ; Takano, Hideki*

JAERI carries out research and development on accelerator-driven system (ADS) to transmute minor actinides and long-lived fission products. The system is composed of high intensity proton accelerator, lead-bismuth spallation target and lead-bismuth cooled subcritical core with nitride fuel. About 2,500 kg of minor actinide is loaded into the subcritical core. Annual transmutation amount using this system is 250 kg with 800MW of thermal output. A superconducting linear accelerator with the beam power of 30MW is connected to drive the subcritical core. Many research and development activities are under way and planned in the fields of subcritical core design, spallation target technology, lead-bismuth handling technology, accelerator development, and minor actinide fuel development. Especially, to study and evaluate the feasibility of the ADS from physics and engineering aspects, the Transmutation Experimental Facility (TEF) is proposed under a framework of the High-Intensity Proton Accelerator Project.