Abstracts and Available Papers Presented at the
2004 International RERTR Meeting

STATUS AND PROGRESS OF THE RERTR PROGRAM IN THE YEAR 2004

Armando Travelli

Argonne National Laboratory Argonne, Illinois, USA

ABSTRACT
 

The overall status of the RERTR program at the time of the last RERTR meeting is reviewed and the progress achieved since that meeting is described. In the fuel area, unexpected failures of LEU U-Mo dispersion plates and tubes under irradiation testing have prompted a revision of the plans to qualify these fuels. While potential solutions to the difficulties with U-Mo dispersion fuels are being explored in collaboration with our international partners, greater emphasis has been placed on accelerating development of monolithic LEU U-Mo fuel. The feasibility of converting several Russian-designed research reactors to LEU fuels has been addressed, and progress has been made in the development of LEU-based 99Mo production processes. The Russian RERTR program has made significant advances. A very important event of 2004 was the USDOE establishment of the Global Threat Reduction Initiative (GTRI). This new program accelerates and combines under the same USDOE management several programs, including RERTR, which aim to secure, remove, or dispose of, nuclear and other radioactive materials throughout the world that are vulnerable to theft by terrorists.

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