Climate of Our Future

Enriched uranium
Catarina Chagas
11 January 2008
Source: SciDev.Net

Brazil has invested US$4.7 million in a project to develop a more efficient nuclear fuel, the Ministry of Science and Technology announced last month (24 December).

Brazilian Nuclear Industries (INB) — a national body controlled by the ministry and funded by public and private sources — will coordinate the project.

The fuel will be used in the Angra 2 reactor of INB’s Angra power plant in Rio de Janeiro state and should be ready in 2011, according to project leader Antonio Melki.

The money comes from the ministry’s Research and Projects Financing Agency. INB will coordinate research by the Center for Development of Nuclear Technology, the Graduate Engineering Project Coordination of the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, the Institute of Energetic and Nuclear Research, and the Marine Technological Center. The José Bonifácio University Foundation will act as financial manager.

The project aims to generate greater reactivity from less enriched uranium. “We should have more security and fewer radioactive residues,” Melki told SciDev.Net.

Researchers will also work on the production of metallic components, such as filters and nozzles used in nuclear-fuel assemblies, to cut costly imports. “We’re working to perfect the fuels we already use in our plants,” says Melki.

INB coordinated a similar project in 1999, developing a new nuclear fuel known as 16 NGF in partnership with Korea Nuclear Fuel Company and Westinghouse for use at Angra. This will be added to the Angra 1 reactor in the next fuel recharge, anticipated this year.

Ninety per cent of Brazil’s electricity is provided by hydroelectric power; just three per cent is from nuclear power. Hydropower energy generation depends on climate variations in water flow and requires complementation with energy stocks when water flow isn’t sufficient.
“Nuclear energy is one of the most important alternative sources in Brazil, as are natural gas and coal,” says Leonam dos Santos Guimarães from Eletronuclear, a state electricity company.