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November 9–12, 2025
Washington, DC|Washington Hilton
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NNSA awards BWXT $1.5B defense fuels contract
The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration has awarded BWX Technologies a contract valued at $1.5 billion to build a Domestic Uranium Enrichment Centrifuge Experiment (DUECE) pilot plant in Tennessee in support of the administration’s efforts to build out a domestic supply of unobligated enriched uranium for defense-related nuclear fuel.
Yasuhiko Fujii, Makoto Okamoto, Hiroyuki Kadotani, Hidetake Kakihana
Nuclear Technology | Volume 86 | Number 3 | September 1989 | Pages 282-288
Technical Paper | Nuclear Fuel | doi.org/10.13182/NT89-A34296
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
The equilibrium time for production of enriched uranium and the effective neutron multiplication factor keff are calculated for ion-exchange uranium enrichment based on the U(IV)-U(VI) electron-exchange reaction process. Experimental data are shown to fit well with the calculated equilibrium time curve. It is concluded that under the assumed process operating conditions, as much as 10 yr would be required to attain 50% 235U enrichment of the product starting with natural uranium feed. The keff calculations indicate that the U(IV)-U(VI) exchange system reaches the critical state at a production enrichment grade of 61% 235 U in anion-exchange systems. From the safety viewpoint, however, it is suggested that the product enrichment grade of the process be limited to 11% or less.