Build the first closed cycle nuclear reactor

Vladimir Putin has announced what he calls the “first nuclear energy system in the world with a closed fuel cycle”, a technology that promises to reuse up to 95% of nuclear fuel. If it materializes by 2030, as stated by the Russian president, Russia would dodge two of the greatest challenges of current nuclear centrals: the Radioactive waste management and the possible exhaustion of uranium reserves.

Uranium? What do you want that. In the Moscow Global Atomic Forum, and before the presence of figures such as Rafael Grossi, director of the OIEA, Putin described the Russian reactor of closed cycle as a “truly revolutionary development” that, in his words, “will eliminate the problem of uranium supply.”

The centerpiece of the ambitious Poryv project (“advance” in Russian) is a rapid reactor refrigerated by lead called Brest -od-300, which is being Building in Severska city in the Siberian region of Tomsk. In the same complex, called Odek, Russia will also build the modules for the spongery and reprocessing of the irradiated fuel.

95% recoverable. In addition to using molten lead instead of water as refrigerant, the Brest-O-300 reactor is designed to operate with uranium-reputony nitruro as fuel. It is its in situ integration with the sponge and reprocessing modules that will allow closing the nuclear fuel cycle.

According to official statements, this system It will allow 95% of the spent fuel to reusea technically consistent figure with the external reprocess processes, where most of the fuel used (uranium and plutonium) ends up being recovered. The remaining 3-5% corresponds to fission products and minor actinids, which remain high radioactivity residues.

It is not a new technology. Countries like France and Russia itself Nuclear fuel already reproces at an industrial scale. And Japan intends to join the club with the Rokkash Plant. However, the Russian project is a pioneer in its attempt to create a fully integrated complex where a fast reactor operates in symbiosis with its own fuel manufacturing and recycling facilities in the same place.

If Russia meets its deadlines, you could have The first complex of this type in operation. And to support him, he has established an International Research Center in the Uliánovsk region (the MBIR International Research Center in Dimitrovgragra), inviting scientists around the world to collaborate in what Putin has called a “new era in nuclear energy.”

But is uranium running out? Putin’s justification for this strong investment is a future with uranium shortage. During his speech, he cited OECD estimates that suggested a possible exhaustion of uranium resources by 2090, or even before: as soon as in the 2060s.

However, the “Red Book” of the OEA does not speak of an exhaustion of uranium, but of An increase in demandwhich could produce tensions in the supply between 2080 and 2110 if significant investments are not made before for the opening of new mines.

Russia’s plan It is a strategic bet. If you achieve the closed cycle reactor for the 2030s, we could witness a new way of understanding nuclear energy, and a world with limited resources in which Russia has managed to outdo the rest.

Image | ROSATOM

In Xataka | France was not prepared for such an extreme climate or to run out of uranium: its energy model cross, and Europe feels it