Fuel

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is requesting comments on the regulatory basis for a proposed rule for light water reactor fuel designs featuring high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), including accident tolerant fuel (ATF) designs, and on draft guidance for the environmental evaluation of ATFs containing uranium enriched up to 8 percent U-235. Some of the HALEU feedstock for those LWR fuels and for advanced reactor fuels could be produced within the first Category II fuel facility licensed by the NRC—Centrus Energy’s American Centrifuge Plant in Piketon, Ohio. On September 21, the NRC approved the start of enrichment operations in the plant’s modest 16-machine HALEU demonstration cascade.

Jessica Woynerowski

As a student, I had the opportunity to tour Urenco USA in Eunice, N.M.—the only commercially operated uranium enrichment facility in the United States. Seeing a fuel cycle facility for the first time and learning about the centrifugal technology used to separate U-235 from U-238 was enriching (pun intended). In the nuclear utility sector, where I am currently working as a core design engineer, the focus is on creating safe, reliable, carbon-free nuclear energy; too often, however, we miss out on other key players in the nuclear fuel cycle.

As a visiting student, I listened to the introductions, the tour guides, the operators, and the engineers at Urenco, and I was hooked. It was so different from what I learned in college about commercial reactors. I was so fascinated with how Urenco operated and their role in the nuclear industry that I started my career there in 2016. The company did an incredible job educating their personnel not only on their processes but also on the work of other fuel cycle facilities (mining, conversion, and fabrication, to name a few).

From the pages of the September 2023 issue of Nuclear News.

For decades, more energy has meant more fuel: fossil fuels.

But nuclear fuel—unlike coal, oil, or even natural uranium—is a feat of engineering, not a commodity extracted from the earth. Now, “more” means more engineering—to boost uranium density or to close the fuel cycle.

W. A. “Art” Wharton III

Multiple market forces on nuclear fuel have arisen seemingly at the same time since the Russian war in Ukraine started. Accident tolerant fuels (ATF), lead test rods, and lead test assemblies have had their first shot in real operating conditions, in recent cycles. But the popularity of their so-called accident tolerance has nothing to do with accidents, since any practical nuclear professional knows that the safety of nuclear energy is already higher than that of any other electricity generation source. The popularity comes down to fuel performance. Are we on the cusp of a revolution in nuclear fuel performance under the guise of accident tolerance?

According to the World Nuclear Association’s newly released Nuclear Fuel Report: Global Scenarios for Demand and Supply Availability 2023–2040, there will be more of an increased demand than previously anticipated for nuclear fuel services and nuclear power capacity over the next several years. The report notes that the increased need for nuclear energy is associated with government efforts to decarbonize energy supplies and achieve energy security as well as growing interest in deploying new large nuclear reactors and small modular reactors (SMRs). The report is available to order now.

Wagner

Rufner

Advanced manufacturing is more than just additive manufacturing, as Jorgen Rufner and Adrian Wagner—both group leads at Idaho National Laboratory—would be quick to point out. Researchers at INL have been working with additive manufacturing (that’s 3D printing, colloquially) for decades. These days, INL boasts the largest industrial-scale electric field -assisted sintering (EFAS) machine of its kind and four other EFAS systems, including one coupled with a glove box for work with radioactive materials. That equipment and more can make samples, fuels, and components for both light water reactors and advanced reactors and for both publicly and privately funded programs.

BWX Technologies, Inc. has announced the details of a contract with the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration to process thousands of kilograms of government-owned scrap material containing enriched uranium and produce more than two metric tons of high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) in an oxide form at an enrichment level of 19.75 percent U-235. That HALEU oxide could supply a fraction of the 22 metric tons the DOE has estimated will be needed by the mid-2020s to fuel advanced reactor demonstrations and meet existing commitments for research reactor fuel.

Centrus Energy’s HALEU demonstration cascade. (Photo: Centrus Energy)

Centrus Energy announced on September 6 that it is conducting final system tests and expects to begin producing high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) in October from its 16-machine gaseous centrifuge enrichment demonstration cascade at the American Centrifuge Plant in Piketon, Ohio. After achieving initial HALEU production, Centrus has specific goals to meet under contract as the company ramps the demonstration cascade to its target annual production rate of 900 kg per year.

Centrus is required under a cost-share contract with the Department of Energy to produce 20 kg of 19.75 percent–enriched HALEU in uranium hexafluoride (UF₆) form by the end of this year. That contract, announced in November 2022, replaced an earlier contract signed in October 2019 that called for first production of HALEU by June 2022. The current contract calls for production at an annual rate of 900 kg of HALEU UF₆ per year in 2024, with additional options—subject to appropriations—to produce material in future years.

Ken Petersen
president@ans.org

The front end of the fuel cycle is getting a lot of attention lately—and it needs it. The war in Ukraine has disrupted the global supply chain for many products, nuclear fuel being one. Several countries have determined that they no longer want to rely on nuclear fuel from Russia. This can be anything from fabricated fuel including uranium, conversion, and enrichment to just enrichment.

Since the Cold War, Russia has been a major supplier of nuclear fuel to the West. Replacing Russia as the main supplier will take both time and money—a fact that has become even more clear as the small modular reactor community grows, and with it, the demand for high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU) for fuel.

The American Nuclear Society has been highlighting the immediacy of the fuel supply problem—which will become a crisis without immediate action—for years. In 2021, ANS wrote to Congress, urging swift action. This year, Nuclear News and ANS’s Nuclear Newswire have run a three-part series by energy writer and consultant Matt Wald on the domestic nuclear fuel shortage. The first article, “On the verge of a crisis: The U.S. nuclear fuel Gordian knot,” was published on Newswire on April 14; the second, “The U.S. nuclear fuel Gordian knot: From global supplier to vulnerable customer,” on May 19. The final piece of the series, “The U.S. nuclear fuel Gordian knot: The uncertain path forward,” was posted on September 1.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will hold a hybrid public meeting on September 7 to discuss the agency’s licensing and oversight of Centrus/American Centrifuge Operating’s American Centrifuge Plant, in Piketon, Ohio. The discussion will focus primarily on the company’s enrichment of high-assay low-enriched uranium, or HALEU.

In the last few weeks of 2021, when it was clear that the Russian invasion of Ukraine had put this country’s uranium fuel supply in jeopardy, nuclear energy advocates lobbied hard to attach provisions to various pieces of “must-pass” legislation—such as the National Defense Appropriations Act (NDAA), the Ukraine Supplemental Appropriations Act, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act—to have the government get the ball rolling on new domestic uranium fuel production capacity. Four times they thought they had succeeded, that Congress was going to allocate enough money to start the United States on the road to a secure supply of reactor fuel, including the higher-enriched fuel needed for advanced reactors.

Dominion Engineering, Inc. (DEI) has developed a number of innovative and cost effective tools and services designed to improve fuel reliability.

In the latest example of Europe’s move away from its dependence on Russia for VVER reactor fuel, Westinghouse Electric Company on Friday signed a long-term agreement with Slovakia’s nuclear power plant operator, Slovenské Elektrárne, to license and supply VVER-440 fuel assemblies.

U.K. energy security secretary Grant Shapps (center), Ukraine minister of energy German Galushchenko (right), and Ukraine deputy minister of energy Yaroslav Demchenkov (left) with captured Russian military vehicles in Kyiv on August 22. (Photo: BEIS Communications)

The U.K. government has announced its intention to provide a loan guarantee of £192 million (about $244 million) to enable Britain-based Urenco to supply Ukraine’s nuclear operator Energoatom with uranium enrichment services. (Urenco has been a supplier to Energoatom since 2009.) The loan is to be made through UK Export Finance, the nation’s export credit agency.

According to the August 23 announcement, the added support will “strengthen Ukraine’s energy security and further isolate Putin by helping the country maintain its independence from Russian nuclear fuel.” Once provided, the additional funds will boost the United Kingdom’s total nonmilitary assistance to Ukraine to nearly £5 billion (about $6.4 billion), the government stated.

The announcement came as Grant Shapps, U.K. secretary of state for energy security and net zero, visited Kyiv to meet with senior government ministers and leading energy figures—including Energoatom president Petro Kotin and Ukraine’s deputy prime minister Oleksandr Kubrakov and energy minister German Galushchenko—to discuss British support for Ukraine’s eventual recovery.

Through its now one-year-old Nuclear Fuel Fund, the U.K. government has awarded Westinghouse three grants to upgrade and expand the Springfields Fuel Fabrication Facility to support Britain’s next-generation nuclear reactors, the American-based company announced yesterday.

Framatome’s Protect EATF assembly. (Photo: Framatome)

The nuclear industry’s first 100 percent accident tolerant fuel assembly has successfully completed its initial cycle of operation at a U.S. nuclear power plant, Framatome announced earlier this week.

Following 24 months of operation at Constellation Energy’s two-unit Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant in Lusby, Md., testing and inspections confirm that Framatome’s lead Enhanced Accident Tolerant Fuel (EATF) assembly safely withstood in-reactor conditions and performed as designed, according to the French-based company.

"The accelerated delivery and proven performance of our technology reflects the dedication and expertise of our people with the collaborative support from the industry,” said Lionel Gaiffe, senior executive vice president of Framatome’s fuel business unit. “Collectively, we are one step closer in the qualification of our Protect EATF technology for the nuclear industry. With the adoption and implementation of our enhanced technologies, our industry partners continue to demonstrate their commitment to enhance the safety and performance of their reliable, low-carbon, energy operations.”

TerraPower and Centrus Energy Corp. announced on July 17 that they have signed a memorandum of understanding to “significantly expand their collaboration aimed at establishing commercial-scale, domestic production capabilities for high-assay, low-enriched uranium (HALEU)” to supply fuel for TerraPower’s first Natrium reactor. Nearly three years ago, TerraPower first announced plans to work with Centrus to establish commercial-scale HALEU production facilities. The two companies signed a contract in 2021 for services to help expedite the commercialization of enrichment technology at Centrus’s Piketon, Ohio, facility.

The current bull market for uranium seems to be heating up. “Fundamentals are strong, and new political incentives are in place to spur nuclear development,” according to an article on the Proactive Investors website, which also noted that the uranium supply “will need to increase significantly to meet the market’s needs if nuclear is to become a key source of energy in the global push to reduce carbon emissions.”

The European Union has selected a Westinghouse-led consortium to develop and deliver “a secure, fully European nuclear fuel supply” for Russian-designed VVER reactors in the EU and Ukraine, the U.S.-based firm announced last week.

Urenco announced July 6 that it will expand enrichment capacity at its U.S. site in Eunice, N.M.—known as UUSA—by adding new centrifuge cascades to increase capacity by about 700 metric tons of separative work units per year, or a 15 percent increase, with the first new cascades coming on line in 2025.