2018 | AFC ACCOMPLISHMENTS 53 Sintering kinetic data will assist scale-up manufacturing of high uranium density accident tolerant fuels to an industrial setting. Microstructures of the as sintered pellets are shown in Figure 2 (a), which exhibited approximately 9% porosity, with darker grey uranium oxide impurities.The surface (Figure 2 (b)) exhibited slightly more oxide contaminant. At low temperatures, it is believed that the U3Si2 low density green pellet allows exposure of oxygen to the powder surfaces, which forms oxides precipitates and reduces sinterability of the powder.This effect is not mitigated by the Zr getter until the oxidation of Zr is activated above ~700°C. Because of this, sintering of U3Si2 in the glove box dilatometer achieved around 91% of the theoretical density, slightly lower than a pristine sintering environment. Furnace ramp rate did not largely impact the resultant pellet density in this study, although further investigations are required to evaluate if the microstructure is impacted at the higher ramp rates. Sintering in hydrogen was shown to be detrimental at temperatures between 200°C and 400°C, which is suspected to be caused by hydride formation within the green pellet.