The development of a high density nuclear fuel for FRM II

FRM II supports the international efforts to minimize the use of highly enriched Uranium in the civil nuclear cycle. Therefore, a new high density fuel based on Uranium-Molybdenum alloys is developed to replace the current U₃Si₂ fuel. The project comprises reactor physics calculations (as detailled in the recent talk of A. Röhrmoser), fuel manufacturing developments from laboratory scale to a fully industrialized process, measurement of physical properties of fresh and spent fuel and irradiation tests to assess the behaviour of the fuel in the reactor. This talk gives an overview of the fuel development activities at FRM II and in the international community.