KEPCO NF has announced that a way of measuring gadolinia content, developed by the Company, has been confirmed as an international standard by all the ISO 13 members on November 13 after going through the FDIS (Final Draft of International Standard) process. The new method involves a core quality-control technology that is applied to measure the composition of gadolinium and uranium that are contained in gadolinium pellets.
The new method curtails dramatically the time required for measuring gadolinia to 10 minutes from the previous 1 to 2 hours. Moreover, since samples of only several milligrams are required for testing, the new method is highly economical. The accuracy of measuring gadolinia is also very high, compared to those prevailing in foreign countries.
KEPCO NF President &CEO Kim Ki-Hak said that the nuclear fuel firm has worked hard to get the new method of measuring gadolinia content registered as an international standard for the past three years. He said it is significant that Korea’s quality-control nuclear technology was recognized worldwide with the development of the state-of-the- art technology measuring gadolinia. He added that the new technology will provide a boost to Korea’s international status in the arena of quality standard.
The process of acquiring international standard is divided into four stages: NWIP (New Work Item Proposal), CD (Committee Draft). DIS (Draft of International Standard) and FDIS (Final Draft of International Standard). The proposals of international standard need to be approved by committee members at every stage. The KEPCO NF’s innovative method was approved by all the 13 committee members at the Final Draft of International Standard process on November 13 2012. Subsequently, it was registered as an international standard of measuring gadolinia content.
KEPCO NF, the only Korean company that designs and manufactures nuclear fuel, supplies fuels to all the 23 domestic atomic power plants. It is a state-invested company under the administrative control of the Ministry of Knowledge Economy. KEPCO NF was put in the hall of fame of admired enterprises after being chosen as a national enterprise with excellent quality competitiveness for the 12 consecutive years
