Preparation of stoichiometric uranium dioxide (UO 2.000 ) via electro-reduction method in LiCl molten salt

A slight variation in O/U ratio usually exists in uranium dioxide, due to spontaneous oxidation in air. The conventional method to fabricate uranium dioxide by reducing triuranium octoxide in H 2 atmosphere shows disadvantages in low safety and unstable quality in O/U ratio. In this paper, an effective method was proposed to fabricate stoichiometric uranium dioxide (UO 2.000 ) powder, in which triuranium octoxide was directly electro-reduced to uranium dioxide in molten salt. The mechanism was analyzed and the quality of prepared sample was verified by XRD, Raman spectra and TG/DSC measurements.