Contribution of the EC to a European Strategy for HLW Management thourgh P&T: Presentation of MYRRHA and its Role in the European P&T Strategy

MYRRHA is an experimental ADS currently being developed at SCK•CEN in replacement of material testing reactor BR2. The MYRRHA facility is conceived as a flexible fast spectrum irradiation facility, which is able to run in both subcritical as critical modes. The applications catalogue of MYRRHA includes fuel developments for innovative reactor systems, material developments for GEN IV systems and fusion reactors, doped silicon production, radio-isotope production and fundamental science applications thanks to the high power proton accelerator. Next to these applications, MYRRHA will demonstrate the ADS full concept by coupling a high power proton accelerator, a multi-megawatts spallation target and a subcritical reactor at reasonable power level to allow operational feedback, scalable to an industrial demonstrator and allow the study of efficient transmutation of high-level nuclear waste. Since MYRRHA is based on the heavy liquid metal technology, namely lead-bismuth eutectic (LBE), it will be able to significantly contribute to the development of Lead Fast Reactor (LFR) technology and will play the role of the European Technology Pilot Plant in the roadmap for LFR. The current design of the MYRRHA ADS and its ability to contribute to the EC strategy for high level waste management through P&T are discussed.