SAFETY AND ENVIRONMENTAL ASPECTS OF VANADIUM ALLOYS

Two important safety-related and environmental aspects of vanadium all oys are considered; the early doses that could potentially be delivere d at the plant site boundary in the event of an accidental release of first-wall material and the disposal and recycling options for expired first wall-blanket material. The reference alloys V-15Cr-5Ti and V-3T i-1Si are found to lead to similar doses and these are roughly an orde r of magnitude below the dose from 316L steel. These alloys appear to be excellent candidates for multiple recycling via high-vacuum remelti ng/refining, with consequent reductions in the consumption of alloy an d the quantities of waste requiring geological isolation. The doses fr om accidental releases are found to be independent of the number of us age cycles.