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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.
D. R. Kingdon, A. A. Harms
Nuclear Technology | Volume 116 | Number 1 | October 1996 | Pages 1-8
Technical Paper | Fission Reactor | doi.org/10.13182/NT96-A35307
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The average fuel pellet power ratio in a pellet-suspension core is investigated. This ratio relates the electric power required to sustain the pellet suspension to the electric power derivable from the fission process. For 2% enriched uranium in a suspending medium of helium gas, a power ratio >2 × 104 for a range of particle sizes is found. Comparable ratios of 1 × 104 for light water and 2 × 103 for liquid lead as suspending mediums are determined. For each fluid, the power ratio appears sufficiently favorable to warrant further investigation of such fission reactor cores