Current status of DEMO activated waste studies

Current status of DEMO activated waste studies

Current status of DEMO activated waste studies 150 150 UKAEA Opendata
UKAEA-CCFE-CP(23)22

Current status of DEMO activated waste studies

Previous studies of the European Demonstration fusion reactor concept (DEMO) have shown that the expected amounts of radioactive waste at end of life (EOL) are of the order of 104 tonnes. These studies also suggested that comparable amounts of waste will be classified as low level waste (LLW) and intermediate level waste (ILW) 100 years after DEMO EOL. Since these studies were performed, updated models for the DEMO reactor have been developed. To assess the waste expectations from these models new assessments have been performed. These continue to suggest that approximately 104 tonnes of radioactive waste can be expected 100 years post EOL. A significant contribution to the ILW produced arises from activated in-vessel Eurofer steel. Long lived activity from sup>14C causes most Eurofer to be unable to meet UK LLWrequirements for over 1000 years after EOL. It has been suggested that amount of activated Carbon present in steels can be reduced via a decarburization process.
This has been shown to work for non-active samples, reducing the carbon content to 1 weight part per million. Modelling the effect of such a process showed that the amount of ILW mass could be significantly reduced, but will remain approximately 104 tonnes on the desired decommissioning time scales (approximately 100 years post EOL).

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28th IAEA Fusion Energy Conference, Nice, France, 10-15th May 2021