Advanced fuel cycles for use in PHWRs

Pressurized heavy water reactors (PHWRs) were originally designed for employing once through fuel cycles with natural uranium. The excellent neutron economy and on-line fueling due to limited excess reactivity are important characteristics of these reactors. However, PHWRs have the main drawback of low burn-up, approximately 7500 MWd/T, due to the use of natural uranium. Use of neutron absorbers for control and power flattening further deteriorates the burn-up. All these aspects, specific to PHWRs, also lead to management of large quantities of: (i) initial fuel (ii) irradiated fuel, and (iii) radioactive wastes. Some of these drawbacks can be alleviated with high burn-up fuel, which also improves fuel utilization. Slightly enriched uranium and plutonium have been under consideration for this purpose. In situ production of U233, by using thorium along with appropriate fissile feed, is one possibility. Alternatively, U233 can be generated externally in fast breeder reactors. It has been recognized that, when used along with thorium, PHWRs can also serve as efficient burners of excess plutonium accumulated over the years. Fuel cycles have been designed so as to completely reverse the isotopic composition (fissile to fertile ratio) which exists at the beginning of a cycle. These cycles also envisage producing proliferation resistant fuels containing high gamma-active decay products. Most of the reactor physics aspects of the various fuel cycles can be analyzed using simple methods of neutron physics and fuel burn-up. Multi-group techniques and explicit representations of the PHWR cluster geometry are essential. However, core physics and fuel management calculations can be simplified at an exploratory stage. Nevertheless, it is necessary to make sure, using core analyses, that the new fuel cycles do satisfy all the constraints of flux peaking, controllability, coolant void reactivity, etc. The main aim in this paper is to provide a comparative evaluation of the various advanced fuel cycles that are feasible in PHWRs.