Fast Reactors and Accelerator Driven Systems Knowledge Base

Conference Article: The economics of transmutation fuel cycles

Abstract

The fuel cycle cost of any transmutation system is one of the major components of the total cost of electricity generated by that system. The fuel cycle cost was estimated for an 1800 MWth actinide burning reactor (ABR) design developed by MIT and INEEL. The fuel is of metallic material composed of 25-30% of TRU and 70-75% Zr. The cost calculations were based on the cost estimates of fuel reprocessing and manufacturing facilities similar to those discussed in the ATW road-mapping effort. An assumption was made that 10 ABRs will be serviced by the fuel separations and manufacturing facilities, and that the fuel will be discharged at a burnup of 70 MWD/kg of total metal (TRU + Zr). A nominal capacity factor of 80% was assumed for operations of the reactor and electric plant system. An analysis was performed to examine the sensitivity of the fuel cycle cost to key factors, specifically to the unit costs of the front-end components of the fuel cycle and the reactor capacity factor (in effect fuel burnup). The results show that the fuel cycle cost of the reference ABR will be about 11 Mills/kWhe, much higher than that of existing LWR nuclear power plants at around 6 Mills/kWhe. The fuel cycle cost has small (< 14%) sensitivity to a ±15% variation in each of the following unit costs: LWR fuel reprocessing, ABR fuel reprocessing and ABR fuel fabrication. The variation of fuel cycle cost is found to be 3 Mills/kWhe for capacity factor variation from 70 to 95%. Therefore, means to reduce the fuel cycle cost would be needed to improve the economic competitiveness of the ABR compared to other electricity generation systems. This work suggests two possible ways to reduce the fuel cycle cost. One is scaling up the production capacity of the fuel separation and manufacturing facilities, perhaps to service 15 ABRs. The second is increasing the discharge burnup, perhaps to 100 ~ 125 MWD/kg of total metal, which will cut the cost down proportionally. Additionally, the cost of the fuel cycle can be tolerated if the capital cost of the system can be made lower than the other electricity generation systems.

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Reference:

Proceedings of a Committee Meeting (TCM) on “Core Physics and Engineering Aspects of Emerging Nuclear Energy Systems for Energy Generation and Transmutation” held in Argonne, Illinois, U.S.A., 28 November - 1 December 2000

International Atomic Energy Agency, Vienna (Austria)

IAEA-TECDOC--1356, pp:134-147