DEMONSTRATION OF THE ZIRFLEX PROCESS ON IRRADIATED PWR BLANKET FUEL

Fifteen PWR blanket fuel specimens varying in burnup from 80 to 1100 Mwd/ T, were declad with boiling 6 M NH/sub 4/F-1.0 M NH/sub 4/NO/sub 3/ before the UO/ sub 2/ core was dissolved in 10 M HNO/sub 3/. Uranium and plutonium losses to the decladding solution were less than 0.2% in nearly all runs. While these ments with unirradiated fuel, they are of the same order of magnitude as those obtained in the testing of the hot cell HF was used as the decladding reagent, the uranium and plutonium losses averaged 1.0 and 0.4%, respectively. (auth