The whole world needs investment in renewable energy to achieve a Net-Zero policy. Nuclear power generation, which is one of the low-carbon power generation sources, is negatively accepted due to the problem of the disposal method of spent nuclear fuel. Due to the recent nuclear accident Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011, safety is prioritized over economic feasibility in energy generation. Among them, MSR can fundamentally prevent serious accidents caused by loss of coolant through immediate solidification of molten salt. Also, high-temperature corrosion resistance and creep properties of structural materials are essential for the long-term operation of MSR. Instead of UCl3, which is nuclear fuel, we conducted a simulation experiment with CeCl3 having the same trivalent component and crystal structure (hexagonal). The structural material used a Ni-based alloy and coexists in the isometric line connecting the eutectic point and composite of CeCl3 vertex in the phase diagram (0.453 NaCl-0.207 KCl-0.34 CeCl3) for a composition with a melting point of 900 K, which is scheduled for the actual operating temperature. ClNaKCe salts (Na-K-Ce, 30.7%-13.4%-55.9% or 52.0%-29.0%-19.0%) of different compositions of NaCl, KCl, and CeCl3 were used, and each salt had the same melting point. Candidate salts are pre-treated with H2O and O2 10 ppm or less atmosphere to prevent further chemical corrosion, followed by corrosion immersion at 650°C for 96 hours. In this study, through optical analysis, changes in grain and microstructure according to various ratios of cerium (III) chloride were confirmed through corrosion behavior and depth of the cross-section. We aim to accumulate new data in areas where direct utilization of UCl3 is difficult by confirming the corrosion behavior according to the amount of CeCl3 added. In conclusion, the experimental results of adding nuclear fuel salt to cooling salts suggest various structural material candidates and methods for the corrosive immersion simulation of uranium nuclear materials.

Effect of CeCl3 molten salt corrosion as analogous urnium-chlroride for Ni-based structural material in MSR

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