Masanori Takahashi

FLUOREX Reprocessing Technology with Uranium Removal from Spent Fuel by Fluorination - Volatilization Reaction of Uranium -

Abstract A new reprocessing technology, FLUOREX was proposed for thermal reactors cycle and future thermal/fast reactors (coexistence) cycle. The proposed system is a hybrid system that combines fluoride volatility and solvent extraction methods where the major U in spent fuel is separated efficiently by fluoride volatility method and MOX is recovered by well-established conventional PUREX method. The system can recover pure U and MOX with the decontamination factor of over 107 and can drastically reduce the cost and waste generation compared with the conventional one. In order to evaluate the efficiency of U separation process, we measured the volatile UF6 formation rate and made a UF6 formation simulation in the fluidizing bed. The simulated behavior of U fluorination consisted with the fluidizing bed experiment that was carried out at 70s.