Radioactive particles from a range of past nuclear events; Challenges posed by highly varied structure and composition

Johansen, M. P.*; Child, D. P.*; Collins, R.*; Cook, M.*; Davis, J.*; Hotchkis, M. A. C.*; Howard, D. L.*; Howell, N.*; Ikeda, Atsushi; Young, E.*

Science of the Total Environment, 842, p.156755_1 - 156755_11, 2022/10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.156755

Development of the technology for preventing radioactive particles' dispersion during the fuel debris retrieval (Contract research); FY2020 Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project

Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science; The University of Tokyo*

JAEA-Review 2022-010, 155 Pages, 2022/06

JAEA-Review-2022-010.pdf:9.78MB

The Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science (CLADS), Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA), had been conducting the Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project (hereafter referred to "the Project") in FY2020. The Project aims to contribute to solving problems in the nuclear energy field represented by the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. (TEPCO). For this purpose, intelligence was collected from all over the world, and basic research and human resource development were promoted by closely integrating/collaborating knowledge and experiences in various fields beyond the barrier of conventional organizations and research fields. The sponsor of the Project was moved from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to JAEA since the newly adopted proposals in FY2018. On this occasion, JAEA constructed a new research system where JAEA-academia collaboration is reinforced and medium-to-long term research/development and human resource development contributing to the decommissioning are stably and consecutively implemented. Among the adopted proposals in FY2018, this report summarizes the research results of the "Development of the technology for preventing radioactive particles' dispersion during the fuel debris retrieval" conducted from FY2018 to FY2021 (this contract was extended to FY2021). Since the final year of this proposal was FY2021, the results for four fiscal years were summarized. The present study aims to clarify the behavior of microparticles in gas and liquid phases in order to steadily confine radioactive microparticles during fuel debris retrieval in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, TEPCO. As measures to prevent dispersion of microparticles, (1) a method to suppress the dispersion with minimum amount of water utilizing water spray etc., and (2) a method to suppress the dispersion by solidifying fuel

R&D on Accelerator Driven Nuclear Transmutation System (ADS) at J-PARC, 1; Accelerator Driven Nuclear Transmutation System (ADS)

Maekawa, Fujio

Purazuma, Kaku Yugo Gakkai-Shi, 98(5), p.201 - 205, 2022/05

The nuclear transmutation technology is a powerful solution to the "nuclear waste" problem that accompanies nuclear power generation. The Accelerator Driven System (ADS), which combines a high-intensity accelerator and a subcritical core, is a promising tool for nuclear transmutation. In this paper, we will explain the significance and principle of nuclear transmutation by ADS, design examples of ADS, partitioning and transmutation technology and its effects, required performance of high-intensity accelerators, overseas trends, etc.

Basic study for on-line monitoring of tiny particles including alpha emitters by aerosol time-of-flight mass spectroscopy (Contract research); FY2020 Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project

Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science; Osaka University*

JAEA-Review 2021-074, 104 Pages, 2022/03

JAEA-Review-2021-074.pdf:4.91MB

The Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science (CLADS), Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA), had been conducting the Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project (hereafter referred to "the Project") in FY2020. The Project aims to contribute to solving problems in the nuclear energy field represented by the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. (TEPCO). For this purpose, intelligence was collected from all over the world, and basic research and human resource development were promoted by closely integrating/collaborating knowledge and experiences in various fields beyond the barrier of conventional organizations and research fields. The sponsor of the Project was moved from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to JAEA since the newly adopted proposals in FY2018. On this occasion, JAEA constructed a new research system where JAEA-academia collaboration is reinforced and medium-to-long term research/development and human resource development contributing to the decommissioning are stably and consecutively implemented. Among the adopted proposals in FY2019, this report summarizes the research results of the "Basic study for on-line monitoring of tiny particles including alpha emitters by aerosol time-of-flight mass spectroscopy" conducted in FY2019 and FY2020. Since the final year of this proposal was FY2020, the results for two fiscal years were summarized. The present study aims to conduct a feasibility study of Aerosol time-of-flight mass spectroscopy (ATOFMS) to on-line measurement of tiny particles containing alpha emitters which might be dispersed in cutting the debris in reactors of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station for realizing their real-time monitoring. In FY2020, we prepared and analyzed the (U,Zr)O samples and the U solutions as model materials and measured the size distribution of the tiny

Identification of carbon in glassy cesium-bearing microparticles using electron microscopy and formation mechanisms of the microparticles

Hidaka, Akihide

Nuclear Technology, 208(2), p.318 - 334, 2022/02

https://doi.org/10.1080/00295450.2021.1929767

The author previously proposed that the Cs bearing microparticle (Type A) may have been formed by melting and atomization of glass fibers (GF) of the HEPA filter in the SGTS due to flame and blast during the hydrogen explosion in Unit 3. If this hypothesis is correct, the Type A could contain or accompany carbon (C), that ignites spontaneously above 623 K, because of the limited time to be heated up, inclusion of C in the binder applied on the GF surface and closely located charcoal filter. As the previous studies did not focus on C, the present analyses were performed with EPMA whether the Type A contains C. The results showed that the Type A contained C originating from the binder, and non-spherical particles accompanied by the Type A and the film surrounding the Type A contained more C, which is thought to originate from the charcoal filter. These results cannot be explained by the other mechanisms proposed so far, and can be explained consistently by the author proposed hypothesis.

Characterization of radiocesium-bearing microparticles with different morphologies in soil around the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant

Hagiwara, Hiroki; Funaki, Hironori; Shiribiki, Natsu*; Kanno, Marina*; Sanada, Yukihisa

Journal of Radioanalytical and Nuclear Chemistry, 331(1), p.415 - 426, 2022/01

https://doi.org/10.1007/s10967-021-08061-8

Upgrading of recovery method for radioactive microparticles by heavy liquid separation aiming to volume reduction of contaminated soil (Contract research); FY2020 Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project

Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science; University of Tsukuba*

JAEA-Review 2021-023, 49 Pages, 2021/12

JAEA-Review-2021-023.pdf:2.39MB

The Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science (CLADS), Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA), had been conducting the Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project (hereafter referred to "the Project") in FY2020. The Project aims to contribute to solving problems in the nuclear energy field represented by the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. (TEPCO). For this purpose, intelligence was collected from all over the world, and basic research and human resource development were promoted by closely integrating/collaborating knowledge and experiences in various fields beyond the barrier of conventional organizations and research fields. The sponsor of the Project was moved from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to JAEA since the newly adopted proposals in FY2018. On this occasion, JAEA constructed a new research system where JAEA-academia collaboration is reinforced and medium-to-long term research/development and human resource development contributing to the decommissioning are stably and consecutively implemented. Among the adopted proposals in FY2018, this report summarizes the research results of the "Upgrading of recovery method for radioactive microparticles by heavy liquid separation aiming to volume reduction of contaminated soil" conducted from FY2018 to FY2020. Since the final year of this proposal was FY2020, the results for three fiscal years were summarized. The present study aims to develop a novel method to reduce the volume of contaminated soil caused by an accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station. The heavy liquid separation method, which was optimized in the previous year, was applied to nine soils collected in Fukushima Prefecture. As a result, radioactivity concentration and weight of the contaminated soils were reduced by half at six sites by separating the soils into two fractions u

Semi-autonomous remote-control technology of an articulated mobile robot to recover from stuck states (Contract research); FY2020 Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project

Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science; The University of Electro-Communications*

JAEA-Review 2021-025, 33 Pages, 2021/11

JAEA-Review-2021-025.pdf:1.68MB

The Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science (CLADS), Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA), had been conducting the Nuclear Energy Science & Technology and Human Resource Development Project (hereafter referred to "the Project") in FY2020. The Project aims to contribute to solving problems in the nuclear energy field represented by the decommissioning of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, Inc. (TEPCO). For this purpose, intelligence was collected from all over the world, and basic research and human resource development were promoted by closely integrating/collaborating knowledge and experiences in various fields beyond the barrier of conventional organizations and research fields. The sponsor of the Project was moved from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to JAEA since the newly adopted proposals in FY2018. On this occasion, JAEA constructed a new research system where JAEA-academia collaboration is reinforced and medium-to-long term research/development and human resource development contributing to the decommissioning are stably and consecutively implemented. Among the adopted proposals in FY2019, this report summarizes the research results of the "Semi- autonomous remote-control technology of an articulated mobile robot to recover from stuck states" conducted in FY2020. The purpose of this work is to establish a recovery method of an articulated mobile robot from stuck states. In this work, a control method of the robot to recover from stuck states by using redundancy of the system is proposed. In addition, we develop two interfaces. One is a display interface as an operator can understand the situation of the robot and surrounding terrain, and the other is a control interface to provide a target motion using the proposed control method. Finally, the effectiveness of them is demonstrated by experiments using an actual robot.

A 3D particle-based analysis of molten pool-to-structural wall heat transfer in a simulated fuel subassembly

Zhang, T.*; Morita, Koji*; Liu, X.*; Liu, W.*; Kamiyama, Kenji

Extended abstracts of the 2nd Asian Conference on Thermal Sciences (Internet), 2 Pages, 2021/10

For the Japanese sodium cooled fast reactor, a fuel subassembly with an inner duct structure (FAIDUS) was designed to avoid the re-criticality by preventing the large-scale pool formation. In the present study, using the finite volume particle method, the EAGLE ID1 test which was an in-pile test performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of FAIDUS was numerically simulated and the thermal-hydraulic mechanisms underlying the heat transfer process were analyzed.

Water experiments on thermal striping phenomena at the core outlet of an advanced sodium-cooled fast reactor, 2; Proposal of countermeasures to mitigate temperature fluctuations around radial blanket fuel assemblies

Kobayashi, Jun; Aizawa, Kosuke; Ezure, Toshiki; Kurihara, Akikazu; Tanaka, Masaaki

Hozengaku, 20(3), p.97 - 101, 2021/10

Focusing on the thermal striping phenomena that occurs at a bottom of the internal structure of an advanced sodium-cooled fast reactor (Advanced-SFR) that has been designed by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, a water experiment using a 1/3 scale 60 degree sector model simulating the upper plenum of the Advanced-SFR has been conducted to examine countermeasures for the significant temperature fluctuation generated around the bottom of Upper Internal Structure (UIS). In the previous paper, we reported the effect of measures to mitigate temperature fluctuations around the control rod channels. In this paper, the same test section was used, and a water experiment was conducted to obtain the characteristics of temperature fluctuations around the radial blanket fuel assembly. And the shape of the Core Instrumentation Support Plate (CIP) was modified, and it was confirmed that it was highly effective in alleviating temperature fluctuations around the radial blanket fuel assembly.