Project set to investigate safer and more efficient nuclear fuels

The ultimate aim is to make nuclear power more sustainable through the use of ‘fourth-generation’ reactor designs in combination with a coherent re-use and recycling strategy.

The €9.4m (£7.9m) FP7 ASGARD project is led by Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden, with input from UK researchers at the National Nuclear Laboratory (NNL) and several universities.

Today most of the world’s nuclear fleet is based on thermal reactors that use oxide fuels and the so-called ‘once-through’ option — meaning that the fuel is run in the reactor for a period and then put in a final repository for around 100,000 years.

Only about one per cent of the energy in the fuel is actually used, although some countries such as the UK and France do recycle plutonium once before final repository.

‘It is more sexy to talk about the reactors, waste is waste, it’s not that fun,’ said Prof Christian Ekberg of Chalmers. ‘The expression “next-generation reactor” is inherently wrong, it’s not just the reactor — it’s a combination of a thermal reactor, fast reactor, recycling plant, and a fuel fabrication plant.’