What does burnup measure in spent nuclear fuel?

What does burnup measure in spent nuclear fuel?

• A. Total energy produced by the reactor during its lifetime
• B. Energy produced per unit of nuclear fuel (GWd/MTU)
• C. Mass of fuel remaining in the core
• D. Temperature of the fuel during irradiation

Answer: (B)

Burnup is a measure of how much energy has been harvested from the fuel relative to its mass. It’s expressed as energy produced per unit mass, typically in gigawatt-days per metric ton of uranium (GWd/MTU). This means if you look at one metric ton of uranium in the fuel and add up all the reactor-irradiation energy it provided, you get the burnup value. The higher the burnup, the more energy has been extracted and the more the fuel’s isotopic makeup has changed, which influences how the fuel behaves and how it’s managed after use. This is different from the total energy the reactor produced over its entire life, which depends on reactor operation, or from the remaining mass of fuel, or from the temperature during irradiation, none of which alone describes how extensively the fuel was utilized.

Burnup is a measure of how much energy has been harvested from the fuel relative to its mass. It’s expressed as energy produced per unit mass, typically in gigawatt-days per metric ton of uranium (GWd/MTU). This means if you look at one metric ton of uranium in the fuel and add up all the reactor-irradiation energy it provided, you get the burnup value. The higher the burnup, the more energy has been extracted and the more the fuel’s isotopic makeup has changed, which influences how the fuel behaves and how it’s managed after use. This is different from the total energy the reactor produced over its entire life, which depends on reactor operation, or from the remaining mass of fuel, or from the temperature during irradiation, none of which alone describes how extensively the fuel was utilized.