Feasibility study for the application of computed tomography to Savannah River reactor-fuel tubes

Gamma-ray computed tomography (CT) is a potentially powerful nondestructive method for assessing enriched uranium-aluminum (U-Al) reactor-fuel tubes produced at the Westinghouse Savannah River Company (WSRC). Several proof-of-principle experiments were performed to obtain data that can be used to determine the feasibility and general operating parameters of a CT instrument for this application. We inspected a mock-fuel tube (contains U-238 instead of U-235) supplied by WSRC to assess the ability of CT to measure and distinguish changes in U density in the U-Al core, to distinguish the end of the U-Al core from Al, and to distinguish changes in the Al cladding thickness. The results indicate that CT can provide meaningful information about interior details and spatial measurements for both the U-Al core and Al cladding of the reactor-fuel tube. This feasibility study demonstrates the quantitative possibilities obtained from the nuclear-spectroscopy-based CT scanners used. 21 refs.