Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
Spent nuclear fuel, occasionally called used nuclear fuel, is nuclear fuel that has been irradiated in a nuclear reactor (usually at a nuclear power plant). It is no longer useful in sustaining a nuclear reaction in an ordinary thermal reactor and, depending on its point along the nuclear fuel cycle , it will have different isotopic ...
The radiation hazard from spent nuclear fuel declines as its radioactive components decay, but remains high for many years. For example 10 years after removal from a reactor, the surface dose rate for a typical spent fuel assembly still exceeds 10,000 rem/hour, resulting in a fatal dose in just minutes. [20]
The nuclear fuel cycle, also called nuclear fuel chain, is the progression of nuclear fuel through a series of differing stages. It consists of steps in the front end , which are the preparation of the fuel, steps in the service period in which the fuel is used during reactor operation, and steps in the back end , which are necessary to safely ...
Spent nuclear fuel contains abundant fertile uranium and traces of fissile materials. [20] Methods such as the PUREX process can be used to remove useful actinides for the production of active nuclear fuel. Another option is to find applications for the isotopes in nuclear waste so as to re-use them. [115]
The high short-term radioactivity of spent nuclear fuel is primarily from fission products with short half-life.The radioactivity in the fission product mixture is mostly due to short-lived isotopes such as 131 I and 140 Ba, after about four months 141 Ce, 95 Zr/ 95 Nb and 89 Sr constitute the largest contributors, while after about two or three years the largest share is taken by 144 Ce/ 144 ...
About 19,000 tons of spent fuel, a byproduct of nuclear power generation, is stored at power plants across Japan, taking up about 80% of their storage capacity, according to the economy and ...
When a sustained nuclear fusion power plant is built, it has the potential to be capable of extracting all the fission energy that remains in spent fission fuel, reducing the volume of nuclear waste by orders of magnitude, and more importantly, eliminating all actinides present in the spent fuel, substances which cause security concerns.
The most long-lived radioactive wastes, including spent nuclear fuel, usually must be contained and isolated from the environment for a long period of time. Spent nuclear fuel storage is mostly a problem in the United States, following a 1977 prohibition by then-President Jimmy Carter on nuclear fuel recycling. France, The United Kingdom, and ...