The result and experience on Pu fuels and their handling in Power Reactor and Nuclear Fuel Development Corp. are compiled in memory of the 10th anniversary of establishment of the first Pu fuel laboratory on Nov. 26, 1960. The second facility was built at the end of 1971 as a Pu fuel fabrication facility. The amount of Pu fuels fabricated in both facilities reached 15, 000 fuel rods with 13t of mixed oxide pellets mostly for JOYO and DCA, and is further increasing for FUGEN. Quality assurance system has been arranged in accordance with increase of the fuel produced, and a fully documented system was completed for the FUGEN Pu fuel.
Research and development work for Pu fuels has been focussed on physical properties of mixed oxide, and in and out of pile evaluation of the fuel performance together with some activities related to Pu fuel design, and these results have been compiled in computer codes including fuel performance codes, PIPER and ACTIVE-II. Irradiation testings of the mixed oxide fuels totaling 418 rods were carried out successfully in JRR-2, JMTR, HBWR, SAXTON, GETR, Rapsodie and Dounreay. Besides, 3, 624 fuel rods were fabricated and used for critical experiments in DCA, TCA,
etc.
Concerning the safety control against Pu handling were described control systems for confinement, criticality, accountancy, radiation exposure, and safeguarding, stressed on socalled “zero contamination control”.
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