Efficient transmutation of long-lived fission products in a Gamma Factory beam driven advanced nuclear energy system

TL;DR

This paper explores using the Gamma Factory's high-intensity gamma-ray beams to drive an advanced nuclear energy system for efficient transmutation of long-lived fission products, potentially reducing nuclear waste over 20 years.

Contribution

It demonstrates the feasibility of GF-driven ANES for transmuting LLFPs, showing comparable efficiency to proton beam schemes with added transmutation capacity.

Findings

ANES thermal power can exceed 500 MWt with GF beams.

Transmutation rate of 30% for five LLFPs over 20 years.

GF beam efficiency is 14 times lower than proton beams, but overall power efficiency is comparable.

Abstract

The Gamma Factory (GF) project aims to generate high-intensity $\gamma$-ray beams of tunable energy and relatively small energy spread. Such beams can be optimized to generate an intense photo-neutron source, capable of driving an advanced nuclear energy system (ANES) for nuclear waste transmutation and supplying electrical power that is necessary for the GF operation mode of the Large Hadron Collider storage ring. In this study, we investigate the feasibility of driving ANES with the GF beam which is optimized to maximize the neutron production rate. The dependence of the ANES thermal power on the distance between the positions of the ANES and the GF $\gamma$-ray source is evaluated. For the $\gamma$-ray beam reaching the intensity of $\sim$$10^{19}$ photons per second, the ANES thermal power could exceed $500\,$MWt. Under the assumption that ANES operates over $20$ years, the transmutation rate could reach $30\%$ for five typical long-lived fission products (LLFPs): $^{79}$Se, $^{99}$Tc, $^{107}$Pd, $^{129}$I, $^{137}$Cs. Our comparative studies show that although the neutron production efficiency of the GF $\gamma$-ray beam (per MW of the beam power) is approximately $14$ times lower than that of the $500\,$MeV proton beam, the overall net ANES power production efficiency for the GF beam driver scheme could be comparable to that of the proton beam driver scheme, while providing additional transmutation capacity, not available for the proton beam driven scheme. It is suggested that the GF-based ANES could provide a viable solution for the efficient transmutation of LLFPs without isotopic separation.