CAP1400 Fuel Assembly Development and PWR Fuel Assembly Technology Progress in China

Abstract

In 1990s the first generation of PWR fuel assembly FA300 was developed in China. With constantly design improvements over the following 20 years, three types of FA300 fuel assemblies have been developed with max fuel assembly average burnup reach 40000 MWd/tU and successfully used in 300MWe PWRs. By now over 1100 fuel assemblies of FA300 series have been successfully operated in three different 300MWe PWRs with satisfied operation reliability. The CAP1400 fuel assembly development program was launched in 2010 which includes new zirconium cladding material development, UO2 pellet development, high performance fuel assembly mechanical structure development, fuel rod performance code and fuel assembly seismic analysis code development, out-of-pile fuel assembly test facility construction and in core irradiation program. The main purpose of CAP1400 fuel assembly development program is to meet the needs of self-sufficient fuel supply to CAP1400 reactor. Based on FA300 and CAP1400 fuel assembly development, a full series of PWR Fuel R&D technology and test system has been successfully established by SNERDI which will continuously support the fuel assembly improving and new type of fuel development. This paper will mainly describe the PWR fuel technology including cladding technology, pellet technology, fuel assembly mechanical design technology, fuel assembly test facility and test technology, fuel rod and fuel assembly code development progress. Furthermore, the development progress of CAP1400 fuel assembly will also be introduced. By now two types of new zirconium alloys have been selected as candidate alloys, all of the out-of pile performance tests have been finished. Both two alloys show good corrosion resistance. Through full series of fuel assembly components performance tests, the fuel assembly has finished design finalization. Most of the fuel assembly mechanical and hydraulic tests will be finished by the end of 2016. The test reactor irradiation program and commercial PWR irradiation program are also on the schedule. After the LTA program and commercial application licensing, the CAP1400 fuel assembly is anticipated to provide adequate burnup capability and operation reliability to CAP1400 reactor in China.