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Front-end nuclear fuel supply cooperation: Turning allied interdependence into strategic advantage
The global nuclear revival, which is fueled by unprecedented demand for firm, affordable, dispatchable power for artificial intelligence and data center build-out, energy security imperatives, and climate commitments, has exposed a structural reality of the Western fuel cycle: No single allied nation currently possesses the full suite of front-end capabilities. From mining through conversion, enrichment, fabrication, and the emerging deconversion and metallization steps required for reactor fuels, capability is distributed across Canada, France, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States (collectively, the “Sapporo Five”), as well as a small group of close partners.
J. M. Davidson, L. O. Gates, and R. E. Nightingale
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 26 | Number 1 | September 1966 | Pages 90-98
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE66-A17191
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Radiation effects were determined in samples of borated graphite used as a neutron shield in the Enrico Fermi Power Plant. The material nominally contained 5 or 7 wt% boron as boron-carbide particles in a nuclear-graphite matrix. The graphite from the center of the graphitizing furnace had a shiny, grey appearance. Microscopy studies showed that the boron carbide had melted and the graphite particles were recrystallized. The remaining material had the usual dull black appearance of nuclear graphite., Most irradiation tests were conducted at 370 and 500°C to a total thermal-neutron dose of 2.5 × 1021 n/cm2 in a predominantly thermal-neutron spectrum. Dimensional changes and other radiation effects were much larger than those in nonborated materials. One grey sample expanded 3.3%, but dimensional changes and other property changes in the black materials were generally less., The radiation effects have been attributed primarily to carbon-atom displacements caused by the energetic lithium and helium atoms in the 10B(n,α)7Li reaction. The faster rate of damage in the grey material is believed to have been due to the finer dispersion of boron in the matrix. This finer dispersion would allow more of the helium and lithium atoms to escape from the boron-carbide particles and produce carbon-atom displacements., Preliminary tests in a neutron spectrum, where the ratio of thermal-to-fast neutrons was less than 1% of that in the flux utilized in the above experiments, produced much smaller changes for comparable fast-neutron doses. This is further evidence that most damage is caused by thermal neutrons.