• Energy Research

Abstract The determination of radionuclide source terms is vital for any reactor design and licensing safety evaluation. This paper provides an overview of the PBMR analysis tools with specific focus on the modelling of mobile and deposited radionuclide source terms within the pressure boundary of a typical pebble-bed high temperature reactor (HTR). The main focus is on the Dust and Activity Migration and Distribution (DAMD) software code system that models the activation, migration and time-dependent distribution of dust and atomic particles in an HTR such as the AVR and PBMR. Since DAMD provides a time-dependent systems integrated model of HTR designs, most of the obvious physical phenomena relevant to source terms are at play. These include the neutron flux, activation cross-sections, radioactive decay, dust production rates, dust impurity levels, dust filter capabilities, dust particle size distributions, thermal–hydraulic parameters influencing the migration and distribution of particles throughout the main power system and subsystems, and helium coolant leakage and make-up rates. At this stage the DAMD calibration and validation is mainly based on the operational data, experiments and measurements made during 21 years of operating life of the AVR. The comparisons of the DAMD results with various AVR measurements provide confidence in the use of DAMD for the PBMR design and safety evaluations. In addition, sensitivity analyses are performed with DAMD to determine the bounding system parameters that drive the migration and distribution of radionuclides. The use of DAMD to evaluate design configurations, e.g. the effect of the introduction and placement of filters on the radionuclide distribution, is also shown. In conclusion, the importance of a systems modelling approach for radionuclide transport and distribution within the pressure boundary of a typical HTR system, is demonstrated. Since the DAMD code system is calibrated and validated against the AVR measurements it can be concluded that the radionuclide source term phenomena in the AVR, resulting in the measured AVR contamination levels, is taken into account in the design and safety evaluation of the PBMR.

A number of primary ores such as phosphate rock, gold-, copper- and rare earth ores contain considerable amounts of accompanying uranium and other critical materials. Energy neutral mineral processing is the extraction of unconventional uranium during primary ore processing to use it, after enrichment and fuel production, to generate greenhouse gas lean energy in a nuclear reactor. Energy neutrality is reached if the energy produced from the extracted uranium is equal to or larger than the energy required for primary ore processing, uranium extraction, -conversion, -enrichment and -fuel production. This work discusses the sustainability of energy neutral mineral processing and provides an overview of the current progress of a multinational research project on that topic conducted under the umbrella of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Abstract The quantification of uncertainties in design and safety analysis of reactors is today not only broadly accepted, but in many cases became the preferred way to replace traditional conservative analysis for safety and licensing analysis. The use of a more fundamental methodology is also consistent with the reliable high fidelity physics models and robust, efficient, and accurate codes available today. To facilitate uncertainty analysis applications a comprehensive approach and methodology must be developed and applied, in contrast to the historical approach where sensitivity analysis were performed and uncertainties then determined by a simplified statistical combination of a few important input parameters. New methodologies are currently under development in the OECD/NEA Light Water Reactor (LWR) Uncertainty Analysis in Best-Estimate Modelling (UAM) benchmark activity. High Temperature Gas-cooled Reactor (HTGR) designs require specific treatment of the double heterogeneous fuel design and large graphite quantities at high temperatures. The IAEA has therefore launched a Coordinated Research Project (CRP) on HTGR Uncertainty Analysis in Modelling (UAM) in 2013 to study uncertainty propagation specifically in the HTGR analysis chain. Two benchmark problems are defined, with the prismatic design represented by the General Atomics (GA) MHTGR-350 and a 250 MW modular pebble bed design similar to the Chinese HTR-PM. Work has started on the first phase and the current CRP status is reported in the paper. A comparison of the Serpent and SCALE/KENO-VI reference Monte Carlo results for Ex. I-1 of the MHTGR-350 design is also included. It was observed that the SCALE/KENO-VI Continuous Energy (CE) k∞ values were 395 pcm (Ex. I-1a) to 803 pcm (Ex. I-1b) higher than the respective Serpent lattice calculations, and that within the set of the SCALE results, the KENO-VI 238 Multi-Group (MG) k∞ values were up to 800 pcm lower than the KENO-VI CE values. The use of the latest ENDF-B-VII.1 cross section library in Serpent lead to ∼180 pcm lower k∞ values compared to the older ENDF-B-VII.0 dataset, caused by the modified graphite neutron capture cross section. The fourth beta release of SCALE 6.2 likewise produced lower CE k∞ values when compared to SCALE 6.1, and the improved performance of the new 252-group library available in SCALE 6.2 is especially noteworthy. A SCALE/TSUNAMI uncertainty analysis of the Hot Full Power variant for Ex. I-1a furthermore concluded that the 238U(n,γ) (capture) and 235U( v ¯ ) cross-section covariance matrices contributed the most to the total k∞ uncertainty of 0.58%.

In support of the pebble bed modular reactor (PBMR) Verification and Validation (V&V) effort, a set of benchmark test problems has been defined that focus on coupled core neutronics and thermal-hydraulic code-to-code comparisons. The motivation is not only to test the existing methods or codes available for high-temperature gas-cooled reactors (HTGRs), but also to serve as a basis for the development of more accurate and efficient tools to analyse the neutronics and thermal-hydraulic behaviour for design and safety evaluations in future. The reference design for the PBMR268 benchmark problem is derived from the 268 MW PBMR design with a dynamic central column containing only graphite spheres. Several simplifications were made to the design in order to limit the need for any further approximations when defining code models. During this process, care was taken to ensure that all the important characteristics of the reactor design were preserved. The definition and initial phases of the benchmark were performed under a cooperative research project between NRG, Penn State University (PSU) and PBMR (Pty) Ltd. However, participation has been extended to include Purdue University and INL. All contributions to the benchmark effort were made in-kind by the participating members including the participation in four benchmark meetings over a period of 3 years. Based on the work performed in this benchmark the PBMR 400 MW design with fixed central reflector has been accepted as an OECD benchmark problem and work has already started. In this paper, the benchmark definition and the different test cases are described in some detail. Phase 1 focuses on steady-state conditions with the purpose of quantifying differences between code systems, models and basic data. It also serves as the basis to establish a common starting condition for the transient cases. In Phase 2, the focus is on performing coupled kinetics/core thermal-hydraulics test problems with a common cross-section and material property sets. The six events selected are described, and examples of some results are included to illustrate the behaviour of the transients. The final results of this work will be published in an NRG report and the focus will move to the OECD 400 MW benchmark problem.