Abstract
Silicon carbide fiber-reinforced silicon carbide matrix (SiC/SiC) composites are candidate materials for cladding of light water reactor (LWR) fuels. Loss of fission product gas retention due to the formation of microcrack networks is considered a potential failure mechanism for SiC/SiC-cladded fuels. In this study, a variety of SiC/SiC composite tubes were irradiated with and without an LWR-relevant radial heat flux in the High Flux Isotope Reactor, followed by detailed characterization with X-ray computed tomography (XCT). This first set of XCT data for neutron-irradiated samples confirmed that the internal stresses arising from a combination of temperature gradients and irradiation-induced swelling act as the primary driver for cracking. While the observed cracking patterns varied depending on the tube architectures, the sharp edges of relatively large pores were found to be the common stress concentrator. These findings are useful to help improve the design and manufacturing of SiC/SiC fuel claddings for reduced failure probability.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 109896 |
| Journal | Composites Part B: Engineering |
| Volume | 238 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 1 2022 |
Funding
This study was supported by the US Department Energy (DOE), Office of Nuclear Energy, for the Advanced Fuels Campaign of the Nuclear Technology R&D program and Westinghouse Electric Corporation/General Atomics FOA program under contact DE-AC05-00OR22725 with ORNL, managed by UT Battelle, LLC. The irradiation experiments and XCT analysis were partly supported by the Office of Nuclear Energy under DOE Idaho Operations Office Contract DE-AC07-051D14517 as part of a Nuclear Science User Facilities experiment (project IDs: FY2016 CINR #1715 and FY2018 RTE 3rd #1535, respectively). A portion of this research used resources at the HFIR, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by ORNL. Weon-Ju Kim and Daejong Kim acknowledge the support from the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea Government (MSIT) (No. 2017M2A8A4017642). This study was supported by the US Department Energy ( DOE ), Office of Nuclear Energy , for the Advanced Fuels Campaign of the Nuclear Technology R&D program and Westinghouse Electric Corporation/General Atomics FOA program under contact DE-AC05-00OR22725 with ORNL , managed by UT Battelle, LLC. The irradiation experiments and XCT analysis were partly supported by the Office of Nuclear Energy under DOE Idaho Operations Office Contract DE-AC07-051D14517 as part of a Nuclear Science User Facilities experiment (project IDs: FY2016 CINR #1715 and FY2018 RTE 3rd #1535, respectively). A portion of this research used resources at the HFIR, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by ORNL. Weon-Ju Kim and Daejong Kim acknowledge the support from the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korea Government (MSIT) (No. 2017M2A8A4017642 ).