The recent civil nuclear cooperation proposed by the Bush Administration and
the Government of India has heightened the necessity of assessing India’s nuclear fuel
cycle inclusive of nuclear materials and facilities. This agreement proposes to change the
long-standing U.S. policy of preventing the spread of nuclear weapons by denying
nuclear technology transfer to non-NPT signatory states. The nuclear tests in 1998 have
convinced the world community that India would never relinquish its nuclear arsenal.
This has driven the desire to engage India through civilian nuclear cooperation. The
cornerstone of any civilian nuclear technological support necessitates the separation of
military and civilian facilities. A complete nuclear fuel cycle assessment of India
emphasizes the entwinment of the military and civilian facilities and would aid in
moving forward with the separation plan. To estimate the existing uranium reserves in
India, a complete historical assessment of ore production, conversion, and processing
capabilities was performed using open source information and compared to independent
reports. Nuclear energy and plutonium production (reactor- and weapons-grade) was simulated using declared capacity factors and modern simulation tools. The three-stage
nuclear power program entities and all the components of civilian and military
significance were assembled into a flowsheet to allow for a macroscopic vision of the
Indian fuel cycle.
A detailed view of the nuclear fuel cycle opens avenues for technological
collaboration. The fuel cycle that grows from this study exploits domestic thorium
reserves with advanced international technology and optimized for the existing system.
To utilize any appreciable fraction of the world’s supply of thorium, nuclear breeding is
necessary. The two known possibilities for production of more fissionable material in the
reactor than is consumed as fuel are fast breeders or thermal breeders. This dissertation
analyzes a thermal breeder core concept involving the CANDU core design. The end-oflife
fuel characteristics evolved from the designed fuel composition is proliferation
resistant and economical in integrating this technology into the Indian nuclear fuel cycle.
Furthermore, it is shown that the separation of the military and civilian components of
the Indian fuel cycle can be facilitated through the implementation of such a system.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2096 |
| Date | 15 May 2009 |
| Creators | Woddi, Taraknath Venkat Krishna |
| Contributors | Charlton, William S |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation, text |
| Format | electronic, application/pdf, born digital |
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