fuel is uranium, which was burned into small cylindrical uranium oxide ceramic pellets, piled up in the tube made of zirconium alloy cladding, make it their slender rods, and the fuel rods according to certain rules are assembled into a fuel assembly, is available for plant use. The reactor core at the plant contains hundreds of such fuel assemblies, weighing dozens of tons. Zirconium alloy is a nonferrous alloy with zirconium as the base and other elements added. With the constant improvement of the performance requirements of fuel components, developed has good mechanical properties, corrosion resistance and radiation resistance of high performance grade zirconium alloys has been the main research direction of the advanced countries. grade zirconium alloy and high performance in the high temperature and high pressure steam and water is a must have good corrosion resistance and mechanical properties of moderate and low atom thermal neutron absorption cross section, has good compatibility to the fuel, so only can be used as a water-cooled reactor core structure materials (fuel cladding, pressure pipe, bracket and channel), which is the main purpose of the zirconium alloy.
fuel component is the core component of the plant, it provides energy for power plant at the same time, is the first barrier to prevent nuclear, a direct impact on the plant safety, reliability and economy.
