THE NEW FRESH FUEL PACKAGE FOR MOX BWR FUEL

The Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) being built near Aiken, South Carolina. This facility will be the major component in the United States’ program to dispose of surplus weapon-grade plutonium. The facility will take surplus weapon-grade plutonium, remove impurities, and mix it with uranium oxide to form MOX fuel pellets for reactor fuel assemblies. These MOX fuel assemblies will be irradiated in commercial nuclear power reactors. AREVA Federal Services LLC, is developing a new Type B(U)F-96 package for the transport of fresh MOX Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) fuel fabricated at the new facility. The package, denoted BWR MOX Fuel Package (BMFP), is designed to accommodate two BWR fuel assemblies in a side by side diamond configuration. The package will meet all regulatory requirements including containment and criticality control while meeting the handling requirements for both the MFFF and the mission reactors. The fuel assembly cladding will provide containment for the MOX fuel pellets. The development of the package was based on lessons learned from fuel and package interaction observed during testing of past fresh fuel packages. Design challenges included: fuel impact protection and geometry control. Qualification of the package will be performed by full scale testing performed in two steps. A full scale engineering test unit (ETU) has been built and will be drop tested using prototypic fuel. The ETU testing will demonstrate package capabilities and provide a basis for the certification test unit (CTU) which will be used for final qualification. The CTU will undergo structural and thermal testing. The fuel cladding integrity will be demonstrated by leak testing of the fuel cladding following both the ETU and CTU tests. This paper discusses the BMFP design challenges and the unique design features that allow the user to realize the benefits of using a lightweight transport package.