Use of Savannah River Site facilities for blend down of highly enriched uranium

Westinghouse Savannah River Company was asked to assess the use of existing Savannah River Site (SRS) facilities for the conversion of highly enriched uranium (HEU) to low enriched uranium (LEU). The purpose was to eliminate the weapons potential for such material. Blending HEU with existing supplies of depleted uranium (DU) would produce material with less than 5% U-235 content for use in commercial nuclear reactors. The request indicated that as much as 500 to 1,000 MT of HEU would be available for conversion over a 20-year period. Existing facilities at the SRS are capable of producing LEU in the form of uranium trioxide (UO{sub 3}) powder, uranyl nitrate [UO{sub 2}(NO{sub 3}){sub 2}] solution, or metal. Additional processing, and additional facilities, would be required to convert the LEU to uranium dioxide (UO{sub 2}) or uranium hexafluoride (UF{sub 3}), the normal inputs for commercial fuel fabrication. This study`s scope does not include the cost for new conversion facilities. However, the low estimated cost per kilogram of blending HEU to LEU in SRS facilities indicates that even with fees for any additional conversion to UO{sub 2} or UF{sub 6}, blend-down would still provide a product significantly below the spot market price for LEUmore » from traditional enrichment services. The body of the report develops a number of possible facility/process combinations for SRS. The primary conclusion of this study is that SRS has facilities available that are capable of satisfying the goals of a national program to blend HEU to below 5% U-235. This preliminary assessment concludes that several facility/process options appear cost-effective. Finally, SRS is a secure DOE site with all requisite security and safeguard programs, personnel skills, nuclear criticality safety controls, accountability programs, and supporting infrastructure to handle large quantities of special nuclear materials (SNM).« less