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LLNL, Ampera partner to develop thorium-based TRISO fuel
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory has formed a strategic partnership with Ampera to develop the company’s nuclear fuel concept through a project named THUNDER, for Thorium Unimodal Droplet Ejection for Reactors.
The focus of THUNDER is fabricating TRISO made with kernels of thorium rather than the usual uranium. LLNL and Ampera will evaluate and optimize liquid metal–jetting technology to produce highly uniform, spherical kernels of thorium-232 for later processing into TRISO fuel.
Edgar A. Rhodes, Theodore H. Bauer, George S. Stanford, James P. Regis, Charles E. Dickerman
Nuclear Technology | Volume 98 | Number 1 | April 1992 | Pages 91-99
Technical Paper | Fast Reactor Safety / Nuclear Reactor Safety | doi.org/10.13182/NT92-A34653
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
Results from hodoscope data analyses are presented for transient overpower (TOP) tests M5, M6, and M7 at the Transient Reactor Test Facility, with emphasis on transient feedback mechanisms, including prefailure expansion at the tops of the fuel pins, subsequent dispersive axial fuel motion, and losses in relative worth of the fuel pins during the tests. Tests M5 and M6 were the first TOP tests of margin to cladding breach and prefailure elongation of D9-clad ternary (U-Pu-Zr) integral fast reactor-type fuel. Test M7 extended these results to high-burnup fuel and also initiated transient testing of HT-9-clad binary (U-Zr) Fast Flux Test Facility driver fuel. Results show significant prefailure negative reactivity feedback and strongly negative feedback from fuel driven to failure.