Hitachi, Ltd.

Hitachi Engineering Co., Ltd.

Shigetada Tanabe

Junichi Yamashita

Katsumasa Haikawa

Takaaki Mochida

Akihiro Yamanaka

Akiko Kanda

Mitsunari Nakamura

Shinichi Kirihara

In a fuel loading method of the present invention, a nuclear reactor is operated up to the second cycle without exchanging the fuel. Low-enrichment fuel is discharged from a core at the end of the second cycle and at the end of the third cycle. Moreover, high-enrichment fuel with an average enrichment higher than that of replacement fuel is discharged from the core at the end of the third cycle and reloaded into the core at the end of the fifth cycle. According to the present invention, because the high-enrichment fuel discharged from the core at the end of the third cycle normally has a high enrichment, a short combustion period, and a low burnup compared to the replacement fuel burned for 4 to 5 cycles, a lot of fissionable material are left in the high-enrichment fuel. By reloading the high-enrichment fuel to the core after one cycle or more passes, it is possible to greatly increase the discharge exposure of initially loaded fuel. Thereby, it is possible to greatly decrease the number of pieces of the replacement fuel.

Fuel loading method

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Hitachi, Japan

Shigetada Tanabe