BARC develops automated system for transfer of spent fuel

Mumbai: The Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) has designed a first-of-its-kind advanced automated system for transfer of spent fuel bundles for nuclear reprocessing plants.

"Introduction of this automation system for reprocessing plant is aimed at transferring the fuel bundles directly from fuel handling area (FHA) of storage pool to the dissolver cell in an automated way, without the necessity of using charging cask," director of Remote Handling and Robotics and Design, Manufacturing and Automation Group, BARC, Manjit Singh said.

"This contributes in eliminating dependency on skilled man-power and thus reduction of man-rem (radiation dose) consumption by workers," Singh said.

Singh also confirmed that a preliminary safety analysis report (PSAR) had been reviewed and approved by the BARC Safety Council and that the first automated system for spent fuel nuclear reprocessing plant would be setup at Tarapur in Maharashtra soon.

Work in this direction, he said, had already begun.

Singh also pointed out that the system design for the automated system is such that it could easily be adapted to handle fuel from 220MW Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWR) as well as from 550 MW/700 MW reactors with minimum changes.

Provision had also been made for manual operations for extracting spent fuel in case of non-availability of the automation system, he said.

DN Badodkar of the Remote Handling and Robotics division, who developed the design, said that the spent fuel bundles from nuclear power reactors are stored under water at the reactor site. After allowing it to cool down for given period, these bundles are transferred to a underwater storage facility at the nuclear fuel reprocessing plant site.