Characterization of spent PWR fuel for decay heat, neutron and gamma-ray emmission: code comparison

Augusto Hernandez Solis; Luca Fiorito; Alexey Stankovskiy; Gasper Zerovnik

Characterization of spent PWR fuel for decay heat, neutron and gamma-ray emmission: code comparison

Augusto Hernandez Solis, Luca Fiorito, Alexey Stankovskiy, Gasper Zerovnik

Research output › peer-review

Abstract

Coupled neutron transport and fuel depletion codes were compared on a simplified reference case of a PWR fuel assembly with initial 235U enrichment of 4% and burnup of 51 GWd/tHM. Two Monte Carlo (MC) codes, Serpent and ALEPH2, and two deterministic codes, SCALE and DRAGON, were considered. A part of the nuclide vector was compared for a cooling period of 5 years. Additionally, observables, measurable by non-destructive analysis methods, i.e. decay heat, neutron and -ray emission rates, were compared as a function of cooling time. The differences between the two MC codes are small, mostly within 1%. The differences in results obtained by deterministic codes are larger, and for production of actinides heavier than plutonium they may reach 7%. The decay heat predictions with Serpent, ALEPH2 and DRAGON agree within 1% for cooling time period 1-1000 years, while the prediction with SCALE module Polaris deviates by around 2% within that cooling time period.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	International Conference on Mathematics Computational Methods and Reactor Physics (M&C 2019)
Publisher	American Nuclear Society
Pages	2736-2745
Edition	2019
ISBN (Electronic)	978-0-89448-769-9
State	Published - 1 Sep 2019

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Cite this

@inproceedings{d36ce463ae1d44e0b5784014a82a98e4,

title = "Characterization of spent PWR fuel for decay heat, neutron and gamma-ray emmission: code comparison",

abstract = "Coupled neutron transport and fuel depletion codes were compared on a simplified reference case of a PWR fuel assembly with initial 235U enrichment of 4% and burnup of 51 GWd/tHM. Two Monte Carlo (MC) codes, Serpent and ALEPH2, and two deterministic codes, SCALE and DRAGON, were considered. A part of the nuclide vector was compared for a cooling period of 5 years. Additionally, observables, measurable by non-destructive analysis methods, i.e. decay heat, neutron and -ray emission rates, were compared as a function of cooling time. The differences between the two MC codes are small, mostly within 1%. The differences in results obtained by deterministic codes are larger, and for production of actinides heavier than plutonium they may reach 7%. The decay heat predictions with Serpent, ALEPH2 and DRAGON agree within 1% for cooling time period 1-1000 years, while the prediction with SCALE module Polaris deviates by around 2% within that cooling time period.",

keywords = "ALEPH2, Depletion analysis, Spent Fuel, code benchmark",

author = "{Hernandez Solis}, Augusto and Luca Fiorito and Alexey Stankovskiy and Gasper Zerovnik",

note = "Score=3",

year = "2019",

month = sep,

day = "1",

language = "English",

pages = "2736--2745",

booktitle = "International Conference on Mathematics Computational Methods and Reactor Physics (M&C 2019)",

publisher = "American Nuclear Society",

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edition = "2019",

}

TY - GEN

T1 - Characterization of spent PWR fuel for decay heat, neutron and gamma-ray emmission: code comparison

AU - Hernandez Solis, Augusto

AU - Fiorito, Luca

AU - Stankovskiy, Alexey

AU - Zerovnik, Gasper

N1 - Score=3

PY - 2019/9/1

Y1 - 2019/9/1

N2 - Coupled neutron transport and fuel depletion codes were compared on a simplified reference case of a PWR fuel assembly with initial 235U enrichment of 4% and burnup of 51 GWd/tHM. Two Monte Carlo (MC) codes, Serpent and ALEPH2, and two deterministic codes, SCALE and DRAGON, were considered. A part of the nuclide vector was compared for a cooling period of 5 years. Additionally, observables, measurable by non-destructive analysis methods, i.e. decay heat, neutron and -ray emission rates, were compared as a function of cooling time. The differences between the two MC codes are small, mostly within 1%. The differences in results obtained by deterministic codes are larger, and for production of actinides heavier than plutonium they may reach 7%. The decay heat predictions with Serpent, ALEPH2 and DRAGON agree within 1% for cooling time period 1-1000 years, while the prediction with SCALE module Polaris deviates by around 2% within that cooling time period.

AB - Coupled neutron transport and fuel depletion codes were compared on a simplified reference case of a PWR fuel assembly with initial 235U enrichment of 4% and burnup of 51 GWd/tHM. Two Monte Carlo (MC) codes, Serpent and ALEPH2, and two deterministic codes, SCALE and DRAGON, were considered. A part of the nuclide vector was compared for a cooling period of 5 years. Additionally, observables, measurable by non-destructive analysis methods, i.e. decay heat, neutron and -ray emission rates, were compared as a function of cooling time. The differences between the two MC codes are small, mostly within 1%. The differences in results obtained by deterministic codes are larger, and for production of actinides heavier than plutonium they may reach 7%. The decay heat predictions with Serpent, ALEPH2 and DRAGON agree within 1% for cooling time period 1-1000 years, while the prediction with SCALE module Polaris deviates by around 2% within that cooling time period.

KW - ALEPH2

KW - Depletion analysis

KW - Spent Fuel

KW - code benchmark

UR - http://ecm.sckcen.be/OTCS/llisapi.dll/open/35069579

M3 - In-proceedings paper

SP - 2736

EP - 2745

BT - International Conference on Mathematics Computational Methods and Reactor Physics (M&C 2019)

PB - American Nuclear Society

ER -