Cladding stress during extended storage of high burnup spent nuclear fuel

Abstract

In an effort to assess the potential for low temperature creep and delayed hydride cracking failures in high burnup spent fuel cladding during extended dry storage, the U.S. NRC analytical fuel performance tools were used to predict cladding stress during a 300year dry storage period for UO2 fuel burned up to 65GWd/MTU. Fuel swelling correlations were developed and used along with decay gas production and release fractions to produce circumferential average cladding stress predictions with the FRAPCON-3.5 fuel performance code. The resulting stresses did not result in cladding creep failures. The maximum creep strains accumulated were on the order of 0.54–1.04%, but creep failures are not expected below at least 2% strain. The potential for delayed hydride cracking was assessed by calculating the critical flaw size required to trigger this failure mechanism. The critical flaw size far exceeded any realistic flaw expected in spent fuel at end of reactor life.