Past exam of the MPhil in nuclear energy course of the University of Cambridge / 2020 / Module NE4 / 1 / b / Solution

Use the thermal power when applying nuclear fuel burnup. No capacity factor is supplied, so take a full-power year of $365$ days; if the operating fraction were $u$, the annual quantities in this part would be multiplied by $u$.The corresponding initial heavy-metal nuclear fuel requirement isAll nuclear fuel and concentrate masses below are uranium masses, excluding oxygen. Let $F,P,W$ denote uranium feed, product and enrichment tails, and $x_f,x_p,x_w$ the uranium-235 mass fractions. Conservation of total uranium and uranium-235 givessoWith $P=M$, the uranium oxide concentrate requirement is thereforeThis is not the gross mass of oxide concentrate. Both $F-P-W=0$ and $0.007F-0.050P-0.003W=0$ provide independent balance checks.