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Figure II.23 Radiotoxic inventory of MOX fuel as a function of time
(8.28% Pu, 45 GWd/tHM)
Radiotoxic inventory (Sv/tHM)
10 9
10 8
10 7
10 6
10 5
10 4
10 3
10 10 10 1 10 2 10 3 10 4 10 5 10 6
Pu loss
Pu
Total
FP
Cm
Am
10 2
Reprocessed U
Np
10 1
Time (year)
The facilities involved are plants to separate MAs from HLLW and fabricate fuel or targets,
dedicated reactors for transmutation, and dedicated chemical or metallurgical process units for multiplerecycling.
In a first phase the necessary chemical facilities for separation of MAs from HLLW have to
be designed and constructed. As can be deduced from the above table, a 100 GWe park will discharge
annually 1.54 t of Np, 1.56 t of Am, and last but not least 94-180 kg of Cm. The corresponding fuel
fabrication outputs are: 60 tHM U-Np fuel and 60 tHM U-Pu-Am fuel with 2.5% MA concentration.
Provisional storage capacity would be needed for Cm covering e.g. 30 years production, i.e. 3 to 5 t
Cm. All these facilities ought to be constructed on the reprocessing site in order to minimise
transportation of these highly active concentrates. After conditioning and encapsulation, a transfer to a
dedicated reactor site for transmutation should in principle be possible. However, if multi-recycling of
the targets is required, either the irradiation facilities should be installed near the existing processing
units or dedicated (e.g. pyrochemical) reprocessing facilities should be erected near the reactor
buildings.
4.3.1.2 Recycling scenarios for power reactors [170,171]
Research conducted in recent years has helped to clarify the feasibility of recycling actinides
(mainly Am and Np) in the different types of reactor (FBR, PWR) in different recycle modes
(homogeneous or heterogeneous).
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