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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.
Francisco J. Souto, Robert H. Kimpland, A. Sharif Heger
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 150 | Number 3 | July 2005 | Pages 322-335
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE05-A2519
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
One of the primary methods to produce medical isotopes, such as 99Mo, is by irradiation of uranium targets in heterogeneous reactors. Solution reactors present a potential alternative to produce medical isotopes. The Medical Isotope Production Reactor (MIPR) concept has been proposed to produce medical isotopes with lower uranium consumption and waste than those in heterogeneous reactors. Commercial production of medical isotopes in solution reactors requires steady-state operation at ~200 kW. At this power regime, fuel-solution temperature increase and radiolytic-gas bubble formation introduce a negative reactivity feedback that has to be mitigated. A model based on the point reactor kinetic equations has been developed to investigate these reactivity effects. This model has been validated against experimental results from the Los Alamos National Laboratory uranyl fluoride Solution High-Energy Burst Assembly (SHEBA) and shows the feasibility of solution reactors for the commercial production of medical isotopes.