Thecnical study on utilization of the high-current electron accelerator

not registered   ; not registered; Toyama, Shinichi  ; Hasegawa, Makoto

According to the Long-term Program for Partitioning and Transmutation which was published by the Atomic Energy Commission in 1988, study on the transmutation using an electron accelerator, which was a part of the program, has been carried out in the O-arai Engineering Center. It is the study on converting radioactive fission products for example Strontium and Cesium to stable nuclides by photonuclear reaction caused by high energy gamma-ray made by an electron accelerator. It was thought that a 100mA-100Mev (10MW output power) accelerator would be needed in order to carry out the transmutation study in engineering phase. Therefore, development of the High-Current Electron Accelerator whose target had been 20mA-10Mev (200kW output power) accelerator was carried out as development of elemental technologies on beam stabilization. Construction of the accelerator was completed in March, 1997, afler development of the elemental devices. After the facility assessment, the full-scale experiment of the accelerator was started in January, 1999. However, the reform of the Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corporation caused by the fire and explosion accident in the Asphalt Bitumenizing Facility was hardly discussed between the completion and the starting the experiment. It was decided that development of the accelerator would be terminated until the fiscal year 1999, results of the development would be summarized, and the developed accelerator would be planed to utilize as a beam utilization facility, in the Medium-Long-term Project Program of the Japan Nuclear Fuel Cycle Development Institute which was in March, 1999. It showed the direction that research and development for transmutation would be terminated. According to the Medium-Long-Term Project Program, the utilization of the accelerator was discussed, and research themes of the utilization of the accelerator in the various fields as well as nuclear field were investigated.