POWER December 2012 - 74

NUCLEAR FUEL
MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility:
Turning Swords into Plowshares
The U.S. Department of Energy contracted Shaw AREVA MOX Services LLC
to design, construct, and operate a Mixed Oxide (MOX) Fuel Fabrication
Facility (MFFF) at its Savannah River Site in South Carolina. The MFFF will
convert depleted uranium and excess weapons-grade plutonium stockpiles,
equivalent to approximately 17,000 nuclear weapons, into MOX fuel
assemblies that will be used in U.S. nuclear power plants by 2018.
By James M. Hylko
T
he bilateral Strategic Arms Reduction
Treaty (START) signed in July 1991
was an agreement to dismantle 80% of
U.S. and then-USSR strategic nuclear weapons
in existence. START may have signaled
the end of the Cold War, but it also ushered in
a new problem: potential uncontrolled access
to large stockpiles of surplus weapons-grade
(WG), highly enriched uranium (HEU) and
plutonium. The challenge was how to safely
dispose of these surplus nuclear materials to
prevent their future use in nuclear weapons.
In 1992, General Brent Scowcroft, then
the national security advisor to President
George H.W. Bush, requested that the National
Academy of Sciences (NAS) recommend
disposition options to reduce the
potential loss by theft of these materials,
particularly the plutonium. (See the sidebar
for important differences between each of
the nuclear materials. The early work associated
with the " megatons-to-megawatts "
program focusing on uranium is described
in " DOE Project Converts Weapons-Grade
Uranium to Fuel for Browns Ferry " in the
December 2006 issue of POWER, available
in our archives at www.powermag.com.)
The outcome of the NAS study was that
excess WG plutonium should be as difficult
to acquire for a nuclear weapon as the reactor
grade (RG) plutonium in spent fuel from
civilian nuclear reactors. The " MOX option, "
selected by the NAS as the best disposition alternative,
blends WG plutonium from dismantled
nuclear weapons with depleted uranium
(a byproduct of uranium enrichment) to create
mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel for irradiation in a
commercial nuclear reactor. The plutonium
becomes part of the spent fuel, thus no longer
making it usable for a nuclear weapon.
Nuclear Agreement
The current inventories of surplus WG
plutonium to be processed are based on
December 2012 | POWER
the Plutonium Management and Disposition
Agreement (PMDA) originally signed
in 2000 by the U.S. and Russia, and reaffirmed
in 2007 and 2010. The PMDA commits
each country to dispose of no less than
34 metric tons (~75,000 pounds) of excess
WG plutonium and irradiate it as MOX
fuel in commercial nuclear reactors. The
combined amount, 68 metric tons, represents
enough material for approximately
17,000 nuclear weapons. To implement this
agreement in the U.S., the Department of
Energy's (DOE) National Nuclear Security
Administration (NNSA), under the Office
of Fissile Materials Disposition, contracted
the construction of a Mixed Oxide Fuel
Fabrication Facility (MFFF).
POWER recently discussed the project
and timetable with Kelly Trice, president
and chief operating officer of Shaw
AREVA MOX Services LLC, which is
responsible for the design, licensing, and
construction of the MFFF. He described
the 17-acre MFFF as a " plutonium processing
and fuel fabrication plant " designed to
convert surplus WG plutonium inventories
and depleted uranium into MOX fuel assemblies.
It is the first facility of its kind
in the U.S.
Trice pointed out that the completed
MOX fuel assemblies will look like standard
pressurized water reactor (PWR) and
boiling water reactor (BWR) fuel assemblies.
He indicated that of the 34 metric
tons of plutonium coming from the U.S., 10
metric tons of plutonium oxide are already
available for processing and the remaining
24 metric tons from the weapons programs
will arrive later in the program.
Following irradiation in a reactor, the resulting
spent fuel contains WG plutonium
in a nonproliferent form. No reprocessing
or subsequent reuse of the MOX spent fuel
is planned. Once the fuel cycle use is comwww.powermag.com
pleted,
the MOX spent fuel will be permanently
stored in a geologic repository. The
MFFF will be shuttered when the plutonium
disposition goals are met.
DOE and NRC Licenses Required
The contract to build the MFFF at the
DOE's Savannah River Site (SRS) near
Aiken, S.C., was awarded in March 1999
to Shaw AREVA MOX Services LLC. The
DOE looked at many sites, but the SRS's
existing security infrastructure and experience
with handling plutonium gave it an
edge in the selection process.
Licensing of the MFFF is following a
two-step process. The first step required
submitting a Construction Authorization
Request to build at the SRS in February
2001. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission
(NRC) issued the construction authorization
on Mar. 30, 2005. The second
stage requires NRC staff review of the license
application submitted on Sept. 27,
2006. The license would authorize the possession
and use of byproduct and special
nuclear material. The NRC review verifies
that the structures, systems, and components
are constructed, installed, and can be
operated properly.
MFFF construction officially started on
Aug. 1, 2007 (Figure 1). Overall, the concrete
structure at the main plant is about
88% complete and 12 of 18 buildings are
finished. The Waste Solidification Building,
expected to be completed in 2013, is
forecasted to treat 150,000 gallons of waste
and solidify approximately 600,000 gallons
of low-level radioactive waste streams
from the MFFF for ultimate disposal.
In addition to the 2,400 personnel on
site, an additional 800 people are employed
in 42 states by suppliers to the construction
project. Trice noted that both large
and small businesses are benefiting from
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POWER December 2012

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