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Conceivable Limits for Thermal Reactor Spent-Fuel Recycling

Volume 127 · Number 2 · August 1999 · Pages 186-198
Technical Paper · Reprocessing

David R. Kingdon, Vladimir A. Khotylev, Archie A. Harms, J. Eduard Hoogenboom

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A spent-fuel recycling strategy that could result in only on-site storage of a fraction of the fission products produced during reactor operation to close the nuclear fuel cycle is assessed for thermal reactors, and a conceivable limit of its effectiveness determined. Electrorefining separation of selected fission products from spent fuel combined with complete actinide recycling yields an out-of-core waste stream with a significantly reduced radioactivity, volume, and lifetime compared to the conventional once-through waste management strategy, and thus it provides a possible alternative to long-term geological disposal of present-day and near-term fission reactor wastes.
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