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The long-term safety of water-based nuclear reactors relies in part on thereliability of zirconium-based nuclear fuel. Yet the progressive ingress ofhydrogen during service makes zirconium alloys subject to delayed hydridecracking. Here, we use a combination of electron back-scattered diffraction andatom probe tomography to investigate specific microstructural features from theas-received sample and in the blocky-alpha microstructure, before and afterelectrochemical charging with hydrogen or deuterium followed by a lowtemperature heat treatment at 400C for 5 hours followed by furnace cooling at arate of 0. 5C per min. Specimens for atom probe were prepared at cryogenictemperature to avoid the formation of spurious hydrides. We report on thecompositional evolution of grains and grain boundaries over the course of thesample's thermal history, as well as the ways the growth of the hydridesmodifies locally the composition and the structure of the alloy. We observe asignificant amount of deuterium left in the matrix, even after the slow coolingand growth of the hydrides. Stacking faults form ahead of the growth front andSn segregates at the hydride-matrix interface and on these faults. We proposethat this segregation may facilitate further growth of the hydride. Oursystematic investigation enables us discuss how the solute distribution affectsthe evolution of the alloy's properties during its service lifetime.

Hydride growth mechanism in Zircaloy-4: investigation of the partitioning of alloying elements