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2025 ANS Winter Conference & Expo
November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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The journey of the U.S. fuel cycle
Craig Piercycpiercy@ans.org
While most big journeys begin with a clear objective, they rarely start with an exact knowledge of the route. When commissioning the Lewis and Clark expedition in 1803, President Thomas Jefferson didn’t provide specific “turn right at the big mountain” directions to the Corps of Discovery. He gave goal-oriented instructions: explore the Missouri River, find its source, search for a transcontinental water route to the Pacific, and build scientific and cultural knowledge along the way.
Jefferson left it up to Lewis and Clark to turn his broad, geopolitically motivated guidance into gritty reality.
Similarly, U.S. nuclear policy has begun a journey toward closing the U.S. nuclear fuel cycle. There is a clear signal of support for recycling from the Trump administration, along with growing bipartisan excitement in Congress. Yet the precise path remains unclear.
B. R. Westphal, K. J. Bateman, C. D. Morgan, J. F. Berg, P. J. Crane, D. G. Cummings, J. J. Giglio, M. W. Huntley, R. P. Lind, D. A. Sell
Nuclear Technology | Volume 162 | Number 2 | May 2008 | Pages 153-157
Technical Paper | First International Pyroprocessing Research Conference | doi.org/10.13182/NT08-A3942
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The development of a head-end processing step for spent oxide fuel that applies to both aqueous and pyrometallurgical technologies is being performed by the Idaho National Laboratory, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, and the Korean Atomic Energy Research Institute through a joint International Nuclear Energy Research Initiative. The processing step employs high temperatures and oxidative gases to promote the oxidation of UO2 to U3O8. Potential benefits of the head-end step include the removal or reduction of fission products as well as separation of the fuel from cladding. The effects of temperature, pressure, oxidative gas, and cladding have been studied with irradiated spent oxide fuel to determine the optimum conditions for process control. Experiments with temperatures ranging from 500 to 1250°C have been performed on spent fuel using either air or oxygen gas for the oxidative reaction. Various flow rates and applications have been tested with the oxidative gases to discern the effects on the process. Tests have also been performed under vacuum conditions, following the oxidation cycle, at high temperatures to improve the removal of fission products. The effects of cladding on fission product removal have also been investigated with released fuel under vacuum and high-temperature conditions. Results from these experiments will be presented as well as operating conditions based on particle size and decladding characteristics.
