Developing Spent Fuel Assembly for Advanced NDA Instrument Calibration - NGSI Spent Fuel Project

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Figures

Fig. 11. Relative difference (%) in burnup for a ROK assembly compared to operator-provided pin-by-pin burnups, using pin-by-pin burnup estimates based on (a) PDET gamma measurements in guide tubes and (b) operator data at the corner pins.

Fig. 10. A picture of PDET [31].

Fig. 1. Comparison of calculated (C) and experimental (E) 239Pu mass in different measured spent fuel samples. The calculations were performed using SCALE 6.1 and ENDF/B-VII libraries [9].

Fig. 2. Comparison of burnup codes in predicting the uranium and plutonium isotopic mass for the OECD/NEA benchmark phase 1-B, Case A [9]. (Note "C" stands for calculation and "E" for experiment.)

Fig. 4. Mass ratio of (a) 134Cs/137Cs and (b) 154Eu/137Cs with burnup.

Fig. 5. Gamma ratios vs. Burnup: (a) activity ratio of 134Cs/137Cs vs. burnup (b) activity ratio of (134Cs/137Cs)2/ (106Ru/137Cs) vs. burnup in three different fuel rods [27] (the symbols represent measured data points).

Full text

ORNL/TM-2013/576
Developing Spent Fuel Assembly Standards for
Advanced NDA Instrument Calibration –
NGSI Spent Fuel Project
February 2014
Prepared by:
Jianwei Hu
Ian C. Gauld
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
James E. Banfield
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy
Steven E. Skutnik
University of Tennessee

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ORNL/TM-2013/576
Reactor and Nuclear Systems Division
DEVELOPING SPENT FUEL ASSEMBLY STANDARDS FOR ADVANCED NDA
INSTRUMENT CALIBRATION – NGSI SPENT FUEL PROJECT
Jianwei Hu
Ian C. Gauld
James E. Banfield
∗
Steven E. Skutnik
∗∗
_______________
∗
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy
∗∗
University of Tennessee
Date published: February 2014
Prepared by
OAK RIDGE NATIONAL LABORATORY
Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37831-6285
managed by
UT-BATTELLE, LLC
for the
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY
under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725

iii
CONTENTS
Page
LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................................... v
LIST OF TABLES ...................................................................................................................................... vii
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ........................................................................................................................... ix
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY ......................................................................................................................... xi
LIST OF ACRONYMS ............................................................................................................................. xiii
1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................................................ 1
2. APPROACHES TO CALIBRATION STANDARDS DEVELOPMENT ........................................... 3
3. DATA REQUIREMENTS AND UNCERTAINTIES IN SPENT FUEL MODELING AND
SIMULATION ..................................................................................................................................... 5
3.1 EXPERIMENTAL BENCHMARK DATA ............................................................................... 5
3.2 SCALE VALIDATION STUDIES ............................................................................................. 7
3.3 DATA REQUIRED FOR MODELING ................................................................................... 10
3.3.1 Fuel Assembly Design Data ......................................................................................... 10
3.3.2 Reactor Operating History ........................................................................................... 10
3.3.3 Assembly Average Burnup .......................................................................................... 10
3.3.4 Axial and Radial Burnup Distributions ........................................................................ 11
3.3.5 Reactivity Control Exposure ........................................................................................ 12
3.3.6 Neighbor Assemblies ................................................................................................... 12
3.3.7 Deformation of the Fuel ............................................................................................... 12
3.3.8 Nuclear Data ................................................................................................................ 13
3.4 UNCERTAINTIES IN FUEL BURNUP .................................................................................. 13
3.4.1 Uncertainties in Operator-Estimated Assembly Burnup .............................................. 13
3.4.2 Uncertainties in Operator-Estimated Axial Burnup ..................................................... 13
3.5 IMPACTS OF UNCERTAINTIES IN OPERATOR DATA ................................................... 14
4. APPLICATION OF NDA FOR SPENT FUEL CHARACTERIZATION ........................................ 17
4.1 CONVENTIONAL NDA TECHNIQUES ............................................................................... 17
4.1.1 Passive Neutron ........................................................................................................... 17
4.1.2 Passive Gamma ............................................................................................................ 18
4.2 NDA INSTRUMENTS ............................................................................................................. 18
4.2.1 High-Purity Germanium (HPGe) ................................................................................. 18
4.2.2 Cadmium-Zinc-Telluride (CZT) .................................................................................. 19
4.2.3 Cerenkov Viewing Devices (CVD) ............................................................................. 19
4.2.4 Fork Detector ............................................................................................................... 19
4.2.5 Spent Fuel Attribute Tester (SFAT) ............................................................................. 20
4.2.6 Partial defect DETector (PDET) .................................................................................. 20
4.3 DETERMINATION OF BURNUP USING GAMMA NDA ................................................... 20
4.4 ACCURACY OF NDA MEASUREMENT OF BURNUP ...................................................... 24
4.5 APPLICATIONS OF PDET ..................................................................................................... 26
5. SPENT FUEL ASSEMBLY MODELING AND SIMULATION METHODS ................................. 29
5.1 MODELING REQUIREMENTS ............................................................................................. 29
5.2 DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW NODAL DEPLETION CAPABILITY ................................. 29
5.2.1 Radial Representation .................................................................................................. 30
5.2.2 Axial Representation .................................................................................................... 32
5.2.3 Output .......................................................................................................................... 33
6. A SPENT FUEL CALIBRATION STANDARD – A CASE STUDY WITH THE THREE
MILE ISLAND FUEL ........................................................................................................................ 35