Impact of modifications in continuous recycling system for U/PU and U/TRU with fast and thermal reactors on fuel-cycle performance and waste characterization

This paper studies the impact of modifications in continuous U/Pu and U/TRU recycling systems on fuel-cycle performance and waste characterization. The continuous recycling systems considered in this paper are multi-stage scenarios consisting of sodium-cooled fast reactors (SFR) and mixed-oxide (MOX) fueled pressurized water reactors (PWR). The study was performed by introducing a series of fuel-cycle cases that slightly differ in their fuel-cycle scenarios, core designs, and types of heavy metals (HM) recycled (Pu or TRU). The major exchange in the fuel-cycle scenarios considered here occurs in the PWR-MOX stage such that one set of cases recycles its discharged Pu/TRU and fabricate MOX fuel by topping Pu/TRU recovered from SFR blankets, and the other uses only recovered Pu/TRU from SFR blankets, and its discharged Pu/TRU is sent to SFR metallic fuel fabrication. All analyses performed in this paper also take into account 1% of annual growth in electric power production. Therefore, the design of reactor cores and fuel-cycle systems must be able to produce additional Pu/TRU in order to cover additional reactors built for the 1% growth in each year.