Data processing and visualization of X-ray computed tomography images of a JOYO MK-III fuel assembly

Tsai, T.-H.; Sasaki, Shinji; Maeda, Koji

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 60(6), p.715 - 723, 2023/06

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2022.2138603

Materials science and fuel technologies of uranium and plutonium mixed oxide

Kato, Masato; Machida, Masahiko; Hirooka, Shun; Nakamichi, Shinya; Ikusawa, Yoshihisa; Nakamura, Hiroki; Kobayashi, Keita; Ozawa, Takayuki; Maeda, Koji; Sasaki, Shinji; et al.

Materials Science and Fuel Technologies of Uranium and Plutonium mixed Oxide, 171 Pages, 2022/10

https://doi.org/10.1201/9781003298205

Innovative and advanced nuclear reactors using plutonium fuel has been developed in each country. In order to develop a new nuclear fuel, irradiation tests are indispensable, and it is necessary to demonstrate the performance and safety of nuclear fuels. If we can develop a technology that accurately simulates irradiation behavior as a technology that complements the irradiation test, the cost, time, and labor involved in nuclear fuel research and development will be greatly reduced. And safety and reliability can be significantly improved through simulation of nuclear fuel irradiation behavior. In order to evaluate the performance of nuclear fuel, it is necessary to know the physical and chemical properties of the fuel at high temperatures. And it is indispensable to develop a behavior model that describes various phenomena that occur during irradiation. In previous research and development, empirical methods with fitting parameters have been used in many parts of model development. However, empirical techniques can give very different results in areas where there is no data. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to construct a scientific descriptive model that can extrapolate the basic characteristics of fuel to the composition and temperature, and to develop an irradiation behavior analysis code to which the model is applied.

Analysis of deposits inside the reactor at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in JFY 2017-2018; The Subsidy programs "Project of Decommissioning and Contaminated Water Management in the FY2016 Supplementary Budget, (Development of Technologies for Grasping and Analyzing Properties of Fuel Debris)

Nakayoshi, Akira; Mitsugi, Takeshi; Sasaki, Shinji; Maeda, Koji

JAEA-Data/Code 2021-011, 279 Pages, 2022/03

JAEA-Data-Code-2021-011.pdf:37.76MB

At the TEPCO's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (1F), an investigation inside the reactors has been carried out, and R&D has been made on methods of fuel debris retrieval and storage after retrieval. In order to carry out the decommissioning work safely and steadily, understanding characteristics of fuel debris in the reactors is required. Therefore, in the development of technologies for grasping and analyzing properties of fuel debris project, the characteristics of simulated fuel debris, such as hardness, drying behavior, etc., of fuel debris for design of removal and storage, have been investigated and estimated, and provided to other projects conducting the decommissioning work. As part of this project, U-containing particles in samples (e.g., deposit on the investigation equipment, sediment in the reactors, etc.) obtained during the internal investigation of the reactors of 1F units 1 to 3 were analyzed. This report summarized the results of FE-SEM/WDX, FE-SEM/EDS, STEM/EDS, and TEM analysis, which were extracted from all analysis results obtained, as a database for the evaluation of the generation mechanism of U-containing particles. The analyses were performed at the JAEA Oarai Research and Development Institute and Nippon Nuclear Fuel Development Co., LTD.

Irradiation performance of sodium-bonded control rod for the fast breeder reactor

Sasaki, Shinji; Maeda, Koji; Furuya, Hirotaka*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 55(3), p.276 - 282, 2018/03

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2017.1394229

Development of field emission SEM to observe high radioactive irradiated fuels

Isozaki, Misaki; Sasaki, Shinji; Maeda, Koji; Katsuyama, Kozo

JAEA-Technology 2015-058, 28 Pages, 2016/03

JAEA-Technology-2015-058.pdf:23.51MB

During irradiation in the fast reactor "JOYO", the changes of fuel structures with the formation of central void occur in the uranium-plutonium mixed oxide fuels (MOX fuels) because of radial temperature gradient. The changes of element (U, Pu, and so on) distributions along radial direction proceed from these changes. Therefore, it is important to study the changes of fuel structures of the minute area in fuel pellet and the changes of element distribution behavior for development of fast reactor fuels. In order to make detailed observations of microstructure and elemental analyses of fuel samples, a field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM) equipped with a wavelength-dispersive X-ray spectrometer (WDS) and an energy-dispersive X-ray spectrometer (EDS) were installed in Fuel Monitoring Facility (FMF). The samples of this FE-SEM are very high radioactivity because the samples contain the nuclear fuel elements (U, Pu, etc.), the fission products (Cs, Rh, etc.) and activation product (Co, Mn etc.). Owing to this, it is necessary to prevent leakage of radioactive materials (particularly, U, Pu is need tight accountancy in law) and to protect operators from radiation. In this installation of FE-SEM, it is selected JSM-7001F (made by JEOL) for base model. The notable modified points were as follows. (1) To protect operators from radiation, lead shields was installed around FE-SEM. (2) To prevent leakage of radioactive materials, the instrument was attached to a remote control air-tight sample transfer unit between a shielded hot cell and the FE-SEM and the instrument was fixing rigid structure without vibration damper. (3) The design and manufacture the lead shields with consideration of instrument maintainability. This paper was described the summary of FE-SEM, the notable modified points, the ways of FE-SEM installation, the result of performance test.

Distribution of radioactive nuclides of boring core samples extracted from concrete structures of reactor buildings in the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant

Maeda, Koji; Sasaki, Shinji; Kumai, Misaki; Sato, Isamu; Suto, Mitsuo; Osaka, Masahiko; Goto, Tetsuo*; Sakai, Hitoshi*; Chigira, Takayuki*; Murata, Hirotoshi*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 51(7-8), p.1006 - 1023, 2014/07

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2014.915769

Since the start of the severe accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in March 2011, concrete surfaces within the reactor buildings have been exposed to radioactive contaminants. Released radiation sources still remain too high to permit entry into some areas of the RBs to allow the damage to be assessed and to allow carrying out the restoration of lost safety functions, decommissioning activities, etc. In order to clarify the situation of this contamination in the RBs, 18 samples were subjected to analyses to determine the surface radionuclide concentrations and to characterize the radionuclide distributions in the samples. Decontamination tests on the sample of Unit 2 were conducted to reduce the levels of radioactivity present near the sample surface. As a result of the tests, the level of radioactivity of the sample was reduced with the removal of 97% of the contamination present near the sample surface.

Immersion test in artificial water and evaluation of strength property on fuel cladding tubes irradiated in Fugen Nuclear Power Plant

Yamagata, Ichiro; Hayashi, Takehiro; Mashiko, Shinichi*; Sasaki, Shinji; Inoue, Masaki; Yamashita, Shinichiro; Maeda, Koji

JAEA-Testing 2013-004, 23 Pages, 2013/11

JAEA-Testing-2013-004.pdf:8.59MB

In the accident of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant of Tokyo Electric Power Co. accompanying the Great East Japan Earthquake, fuel assemblies kept in the spent fuel pool of reactor units 1-4, were exposed to the inconceivable environment such as falling and mixing of rubble, especially seawater were injected into unit 2-4. In order to evaluate the integrity of the fuel assemblies in spent fuel pools, and in the long-term storage after transported to the common storage pool, the immersion tests were performed using zircaloy-2 fuel cladding tubes irradiated in the advanced thermal reactor Fugen. The immersion liquid was prepared with doubling dilution of artificial seawater, which temperature was 80 C and immersion time was about 336 hours, as assuming the situation of the pool. The results indicated zircaloy-2 cladding tubes had no significant corrosion and no influence on mechanical property by immersion tests with artificial seawater conditions of this work.

Investigation on analytical method for the transfer behavior of corrosion product (CP) in the fast breeder reactors

Matsuo, Yoichiro; Sasaki, Shinji

JAEA-Review 2013-007, 46 Pages, 2013/05

JAEA-Review-2013-007.pdf:4.68MB

Radioactive corrosion products (CP) are main cause of personal radiation exposure during maintenance without fuel failure in FBR plants. The most important CP species are Mn and Co. The deposited radioactive CP cause radiation fields near the piping and components. Then, the deposited radioactive CP contributes to the radiation exposure of the plant-worker. In this review, firstly, collects knowledge about CP transfer behavior in the fast reactor and analyzes it and organize essence of the CP transfer behavior. Secondly, existing method to parse CP transfer behavior is investigated and extracts the issues and discusses it about the solution of those issues. Finally, about a specific example of the improvement based on the solution, a recent trend is investigated and describes evaluated content.

Support system for training and education of future expert at PIE Hot Laboratories in Oarai JAEA; FEETS

Osaka, Masahiko; Donomae, Takako; Ichikawa, Shoichi; Sasaki, Shinji; Ishimi, Akihiro; Inoue, Toshihiko; Sekio, Yoshihiro; Miwa, Shuhei; Onishi, Takashi; Asaka, Takeo; et al.

Proceedings of 1st Asian Nuclear Fuel Conference (ANFC), 2 Pages, 2012/03

Support system for training and education of future expert in hot laboratories of Oarai-JAEA, named FEETS, is presented. The system has been established based on research results on both characterization of Oarai hot laboratory and user-needs. Various programs under FEETS are also introduced.

Fuel-cladding chemical interaction in MOX fuel rods irradiated to high burnup in an advanced thermal reactor

Tanaka, Kosuke; Maeda, Koji; Sasaki, Shinji; Ikusawa, Yoshihisa; Abe, Tomoyuki

Journal of Nuclear Materials, 357(1-3), p.58 - 68, 2006/10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jnucmat.2006.05.052

The performance of MOX fuel irradiated in the advanced thermal reactor, FUGEN, to the burnup of 47.5 GWd/t, was investigated by using a telescotpe, optical microscope, SEM and EPMA. Observations focused on elucidating the corrosion behavior of the cladding inner surface. A reaction layer was observed at burnups higher than about 35 GWd/t. The relationship between the thickness of the reaction layer and burnup was similar to that reported in the literature for conventional UO fuel and other MOX fuels. The existence of a plutonium spot near the outer surface of the fuel pellet had no significant effect on the thickness of the reaction layer. A bonding layer was observed on the cladding inner surface. Its morphology and elemental distributions were not so different from those in BWR UO fuel pins irradiated to high burnup, in which the fission gas release rate is high. In addition, the dependences of bonding layer formation on the burnup and linear heat rating were similar to results of UO2 fuel pins. It was, thus, suggested that the bonding layer formation mechanism was similar in both UO2 and MOX fuel pins.