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Publicatie Laka-bibliotheek:
Actinide transmutation in nuclear reactors (1995)

Auteur	J.H.Bultman
Datum	1995
Classificatie	6.01.5.56/12 (AFVAL - ACTINIDEN (-TRANSMUTATIE/VERBRANDEN))
Voorkant

Summary

The reduction of the transuranics part of nuclear waste is discussed in this thesis.
Only the transuranics and not the fission products are discussed, because they
represent the highest environmental hazard in the long term. A huge amount of 1,000
tonne of transuranics is already produced worldwide, and annually about 80 tonne of
transuranics is added. This material can be used for nuclear energy production, for
instance, as fuel for Advanced Liquid Metal Reactors (ALMRs), but to reduce this
amount will be rather difficult as only 1.2 kg/MWe·Y can be fissioned maximally.
To stabilize the amount of transuranics, one has to operate about 70 GW e in burners;
that is an increase of about 20% in installed nuclear power worldwide.

One can reduce the production of transuranics by recycling in the reactor which
produces them. As is shown in chapter two of this thesis, only the plutonium
isotopes can be recycled in Light Water Reactors (LWRs), because recycling of other
transuranics will lead to a high production of short-lived and spontaneously fissioning
actinides. These actinides make the reprocessing of fuel, which is necessary when
recycling is applied, impossible with current techniques. The production of
transuranics can be reduced by maximally a factor of four by recycling plutonium
isotopes in LWRs.

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