Sol–gel development activities at IGCAR, Kalpakkam

Sol–gel based fuel fabrication processes have the potential to be the nuclear fuel fabrication processes in the future. Hence development of sol–gel technology for nuclear fuel fabrication is being the pursued in the Department of Atomic Energy in India. As a part of the efforts, a laboratory scale facility for fabrication of test fuel pins for irradiation in the Fast Breeder Reactor (FBTR), Kalpakkam has been set up at the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research, Kalpakkam, India. These fuel pins will be vibropacked with sol–gel derived microspheres or stacked with pellets obtained by compaction of sol–gel derived microspheres. The facility is aimed at demonstration of the remote operation of the fuel pin fabrication process through the sol–gel route. A capsule containing three test pins from this facility will be irradiated in FBTR. The design features of the facility and the test fuel pins are described in this paper.