(A) study on the environmental friendliness of advanced nuclear fuel cycle in Korea

Abstract

In order that nuclear energy may be a clean energy, it must be solved that how the radioactive waste, especially High Level Waste should be treated. Nowadays, as we can see from GEN IV international project, the reduction of long lived and toxic waste by transmutation is being studied widely and actively. Especially a great interest has been displayed worldwide for accelerator driven system (ADS) also called subcritical reactors on hybrid system, and fast reactor (FR) to produce energy and transmute radioactive waste in a cleaner and safer way. In this study, the mass flow in several cases of advanced nuclear fuel cycle is analyzed in balanced state. And by this, some indices for environmental friendliness for several cases of advanced nuclear fuel cycle are compared to those of once-through fuel cycle. In view of the results in this study, the advanced fuel cycle with FRs and ADSs will be one of the prime alternative options to relieve the burden of waste disposal because these fuel cycle options can reduce the transuranic material by tens to hundreds-fold compared to the once-through fuel cycle. Resource efficiency can be leveled up so high by introduction of advanced fuel cycles. This study include the clarification of the roles and merits of the FR and ADS in a view point of environmental friendliness, and a few indices for environmental friendliness is confirmed quantitatively by comparative analysis.