Innovative accident-tolerant fuel cladding materials the h2020 il trovatore perspective

K. Lambrinou (1) , M. Verwerft (1) , J. Vleugels (2) , A. Weisenburger (3) , C. Lorrette (4) , Y. de Carlan (4) , F. Di Fonzo (5) , M. Barzoum (6) , A. Kohyama (7) , J. Marrow (8)

1 SCK-CEN - Centre d'Etude de l'Energie Nucléaire
2 KU Leuven - Catholic University of Leuven = Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
3 KIT - Karlsruhe Institute of Technology
4 CEA-DES (ex-DEN) - CEA-Direction des Energies (ex-Direction de l'Energie Nucléaire)
5 IIT - Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia
6 Department of Materials Science and Engineering and A. J. Drexel Nanotechnology Institute ( Philadelfia, USA)
7 IAE - Institute of Advanced Energy
8 University of Oxford

The Fukushima Daiichi event has demonstrated the need for improved nuclear energy safety, prompting amongst other efforts the development of accident-tolerant fuels (ATFs), which are expected to overcome the inherent technical shortcomings of the standard zircaloy/UO2 fuels. The main objective of the IL TROVATORE project is to optimize and validate, in an industrially-relevant environment, some of the most promising ATF cladding materials for use in light water reactors. The ATF cladding material concepts proposed in IL TROVATORE are expected to demonstrate significant improvement in performance when compared to the current fuel cladding materials, thus helping to take a critical step towards an improved energy safety worldwide. To achieve its ambitious objectives, IL TROVATORE relies on academic excellence and industrial support, while also involving standardization bodies and nuclear safety regulatory authorities to accelerate the transfer of key innovation to market. Since the IL TROVATORE project is put forth to address a pressing global challenge, it is an international collaboration between Europe, the USA and Japan.

Mots clés: accident-tolerant fuels (ATFs); fuel cladding materials

Domaines: Physique Nucléaire Expérimentale [nucl-ex]; Physique Nucléaire Théorique [nucl-th]

K. Lambrinou, M. Verwerft, J. Vleugels, A. Weisenburger, C. Lorrette, et al.. Innovative accident-tolerant fuel cladding materials the h2020 il trovatore perspective. 2017 Water Reactor Fuel Performance Meeting, Sep 2017, Jeju-do, South Korea. ⟨hal-02417742⟩