Framatome Commissions Chromium-Coated Facility to Advance Industrialization of Accident-Tolerant Fuel

Recently, France's Framatome officially commissioned an industrial pilot facility for chromium coating at its Paimboeuf manufacturing plant in western France, in order to accelerate the industrialization of its PROtect enhanced accident-tolerant fuel (E-ATF) technology.

It is reported that the facility represents an investment of 30 million euros (approximately 33.5 million US dollars) and uses physical vapor deposition (PVD) technology to apply chromium coating to the surface of zirconium alloy cladding tubes for nuclear fuel assemblies. The pilot facility is designed with an annual production capacity of more than 100,000 chromium-coated cladding tubes, aimed at verifying process stability under serial production conditions. Framatome plans to complete industrial qualification of the process by the end of 2026 and officially begin production in early 2027.

The PROtect technology was jointly developed by Framatome and the French Alternative Energies and Atomic Energy Commission (CEA), and has been advanced with support from France Relance and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). By applying chromium coating to zirconium alloy cladding, combined with optional chromium oxide-doped uranium fuel pellets, the technology can significantly improve oxidation resistance and mechanical performance at high temperatures, and substantially reduce hydrogen generation in the event of cooling system failure, greatly enhancing nuclear power plant safety.

As a globally leading nuclear fuel supplier, Framatome's commissioning of the new facility at its Paimboeuf plant marks the transition of accident-tolerant fuel (ATF) technology from years of in-reactor experimental demonstration to a new stage of large-scale commercial mass production, and will provide nuclear power operators worldwide with nuclear fuel products offering higher safety margins.