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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.
Kiminori Shiba
Nuclear Science and Engineering | Volume 65 | Number 3 | March 1978 | Pages 492-507
Technical Paper | doi.org/10.13182/NSE78-A27180
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Material bucklings have been determined as functions of 235U enrichment in UO2 (0.7, 1.2, and 1.5 wt% 235U), PuO2 enrichment in PuO2-UO2 (0.54 and 0.87 wt% PuO2), fissile content of plutonium (91 and 75% Pu-fissile), lattice pitch (Vmod/Vfuel: 7.4 and 9.9), and coolant void fraction. The reference loading of 1.2 wt% 235U-enriched UO2 clusters was progressively replaced by the test clusters. Buckling differences resulting from the substitutions were analyzed by the new second-order (iterative) perturbation method, on the assumption that neutron diffusion is isotropic and that no difference in diffusion coefficients exists between the two lattices. This analysis takes into account the effect of distortion in radial neutron flux distribution in the substituted core without any iterative correction procedure that is usually adopted in the first-order perturbation method. Also, it is not necessary in the case of the present analysis to introduce any usual intermediate region for taking into account the effect of spectrum mismatch between the two lattices. The material buckling differences between the test and reference lattices, which are in the range of −10.2 to 9.1 m−2, were determined within 3% of uncertainty.