Uranium Release Evaluation from Mononitride Fuel into the Primary Circuit of the BR-10 Reactor

9/10/2025 2025 - #03 Global safety, reliability and diagnostics of nuclear power installations

Dmitriev D.V. Zhilkin A.S. Filimonov E.V.

https://doi.org/10.26583/npe.2025.3.09

The article presents the results of the analysis of experimental data on the release of uranium from mononitride fuel into the sodium coolant, obtained at the BR-10 reactor during tests of failed fuel element.

Nitride fuel is considered in nuclear power engineering as one of the most promising types of fuel for fast neutron reactors, and therefore experimental studies of its properties in contact with liquid metal coolants are of great interest and create the necessary array of initial data for verification of existing calculation models. Such studies were carried out at the BR-10 reactor as part of experimental fuel elements with failed fuel element. The conditions for experiment fuel elements with mononitride uranium fuel and artificial defects in the cladding in the BR-10 reactor are described, an estimate of the rate of fuel release from fuel elements with leaky cladding during its contact with sodium is obtained based on the results of measuring the uranium content in the primary circuit, and a comparison of the obtained estimate with the calculated value according to the model of uranium atom release from the fuel surface by cascade knockout is carried out. The results of the study allow us to substantiate the assumption about the cascade knockout of uranium atoms as the main mechanism of its release from nitride fuel in fast neutron reactors with sodium coolant.

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fast reactor sodium coolant nitride fuel failed fuel element experiment cascade knocking calculating evaluation

Link for citing the article: Dmitriev D.V., Zhilkin A.S., Filimonov E.V. Uranium Release Evaluation from Mononitride Fuel into the Primary Circuit of the BR-10 Reactor. Izvestiya vuzov. Yadernaya Energetika. 2025, no. 3, pp. 122-132; DOI: https://doi.org/10.26583/npe.2025.3.09 (in Russian).