Development of the residual sodium quantification method for a fuel pin bundle of SFRs before and after dry cleaning

ナトリウム冷却高速炉の乾式洗浄試験(使用済燃料ピンバンドル試験)

工藤 秀行*; 大谷 雄一*; 原 正秀*; 加藤 篤志 ; 大高 雅彦; 井手 章博*

Kudo, Hideyuki*; Otani, Yuichi*; Hara, Masahide*; Kato, Atsushi; Otaka, Masahiko; Ide, Akihiro*

ナトリウム冷却高速炉の使用済燃料を模擬した燃料バンドル試験体を用いて、残留ナトリウムの洗浄試験を行ったもの。

In a fuel handling system of sodium-cooled fast reactors (SFRs), it is necessary to remove the sodium remaining on spent fuel assemblies (FAs) before storing them in a spent fuel water pool (SFP) in order to minimize plant operating loads. A next-generation SFR in Japan has adopted an advanced dry cleaning process which consists of the following steps, argon gas blowing to remove the metallic residual sodium on the FA, moist argon gas blowing to deactivate the residual sodium, and direct storage in the SFP. This three-step process increases economic competitiveness and reduces waste products thanks to a waterless process. In this R&D work, performance of the dry cleaning process has been investigated.