Evaldas Bubelis

Description of the European Helium-Cooled EFIT Plant: An Industrial-Scale Accelerator-Driven System for Minor Actinide Transmutation—II

In order to reduce the volume and the radiotoxicity of the nuclear waste coming from the operation of existing pressurized water reactors, accelerator-driven systems (ADSs) have been envisioned. The Helium-cooled (He) European Facility for Industrial-scale Transmutation (He-EFIT) concept is the EUROpean Research Programme for the TRANSmutation of High Level Nuclear Waste in Accelerator Driven System (EUROTRANS) Integrated Project (IP) (EUROTRANS IP) backup option, whereas Pb-cooled EFIT is the reference one. The plant has a power of [approximately]400 MW(thermal). Like all ADS plants, it consists of three main components: the accelerator, the spallation target module, and the subcritical core. This paper describes the He-EFIT design at the end of the EUROTRANS IP as well as the studies performed to support this design: spallation performances, trasmutation capabilities, and plant safety analyses. No specific technology deadlock has been identified, and it might be possible to build such a plant given necessary research and development in support.

Overview of the HCPB Research Activities in EUROfusion

In the framework of the EUROfusion’s Power Plant Physics and Technology, the working package breeding blanket (BB) aims at investigating four different BB concepts for an EU demonstration fusion reactor (DEMO). One of these concepts is the helium-cooled pebble bed (HCPB) BB, which is based on the use of pebble beds of lithiated ternary compounds and Be or beryllides as tritium breeder and multiplier materials, respectively, EUROFER97 as structural steel and He as coolant. This paper aims at giving an overview of the EU HCPB BB Research and Development (R&D) being developed at KIT, in collaboration with Wigner-RCP, BUTE-INT, and CIEMAT. The paper gives an outline of the HCPB BB design evolution, state-of-the-art basic functionalities, requirements and performances, and the associated R&D activities in the areas of design, functional materials, manufacturing, and testing. In addition, attention is given also to the activities dedicated to the development of heat transfer augmentation techniques for the first wall and the corresponding testing. Due to their nature as design drivers, a brief overview in the R&D of key HCPB interfacing areas is given as well, namely, the tritium extraction and recovery system, the primary heat transfer and power conversion systems, and safety topics, as well as some specific activities regarding the integration of in-vessel systems through the BB. As concluding remarks, an outline of the standing challenges and future R&D plans is summarized.