Silicide Plate Demo

The United States to reduce the use of high enriched uranium (HEU) seeks to enable the use of
high assay low enriched uranium (HALEU) silicide fuels by expanding the fabrication windows
for high density geometrically challenging fuel designs. In particular, a HALEU-based design of
the inner fuel element (IFE) for the High Flux Isotope Reactor (HFIR) represents several
technical challenges or the fabrication of fuel plates1.The IFE fuel plate design uses a symmetric
airfoil shaped fuel zone with filler above and below to form a rectangular center. This
rectangular center is then encapsulated in aluminum cladding. The current HEU IFE fuel plate
uses die pressing of Al and U3O8 powders followed by hot rolling to form the fuel zone and
bond the cladding. There is no current process for the fabrication of the HA LEU IFE fuel plates
and an offeror may propose any practical manufacturing method(s) including additive
manufacturing in place of die-press and hot rolling. Disruptive technologies coupled with
proven manufacturing experience are especially encouraged.