Operation and maintenance experience on the fuel handling systems and storage facilities of "MONJU", 1

; ; Yamada, Takeshi; ; ; ; Kaito, Yasuaki; ; Kotaka, Yoshinori; ; et al.

PNC TN2410 96-005, 339 Pages, 1996/03

PNC-TN2410-96-005.pdf:14.53MB

Construction of the 'Monju' fuel handling systems was completed in April, 1992. From March 1991 to August 1992, pre-commissioning tests were carried out. In December 1992, all the systems of Monju were transfered to PNC, and commissioning tests and reactor physics tests, were started. For the first time, during these physics tests, the fuel handling systems were operated for one of the commissioning tests 'Loading to Criticality', without significant problems. 168 fuel sub-assemblies were loaded into the core and the first criticality was achieved on 5th April 1994. The fuel handling systems continued in operation for the 'Loading to Full Size of the Core', power distribution test and for cleaning discharged dummy sub-assemblies. To keep these fuel handling systems working somothly and satisfactorily annual maintenance has been carried out since 1992. This paper describes the operation and maintenance experience of fuel handling systems after the pre-commissioning tests and future study items for system reliability improvement.