Background radiation monitoring using manned helicopter for establishment of technique of nuclear emergency response in the fiscal year 2017 (Contract research)

Futemma, Akira; Sanada, Yukihisa; Iwai, Takeyuki*; Seguchi, Eisaku; Matsunaga, Yuki*; Kawabata, Tomoki; Toyoda, Masayuki*; Tobita, Shinichiro*; Hiraga, Shogo*; Sato, Kazuhiko*; et al.

JAEA-Technology 2018-016, 98 Pages, 2019/02

JAEA-Technology-2018-016.pdf:18.64MB

By the nuclear disaster of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (FDNPS), Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake and the following tsunami on March 11, 2011, a large amount of radioactive material was released from the NPS. After the nuclear disaster, airborne radiation monitoring using manned helicopter was conducted around FDNPS. We have carried out the background monitoring around the nuclear power stations of the whole country to apply the airborne radiation monitoring technique that has been cultivated in Fukushima against nuclear emergency response. The results of monitoring around Tomari, Kashiwazaki-Kariwa and Genkai Nuclear Power Station in the fiscal 2017 were summarized in this report. In addition, technical issues were described.

Establishment of a novel detection system for measuring primary knock-on atoms

Tsai, P.-E.; Iwamoto, Yosuke; Hagiwara, Masayuki*; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Ogawa, Tatsuhiko; Satoh, Daiki; Abe, Shinichiro; Ito, Masatoshi*; Watabe, Hiroshi*

Proceedings of 2017 IEEE Nuclear Science Symposium and Medical Imaging Conference (NSS/MIC 2017) (Internet), 3 Pages, 2018/11

https://doi.org/10.1109/NSSMIC.2017.8532975

The energy spectra of primary knock-on atoms (PKAs) are essential for radiation damage assessment in design of accelerator facilities. However up to date the experimental data are still limited, due to the poor mass resolution and the high measurement threshold energies in the conventional setup of nuclear physics experiments using solid state detectors, which are typically above a few MeV/nucleon. In this study, a novel detection system consisting of two time detectors and one dE-E energy detector is proposed and being constructed to measure the PKA spectra. The system and detector design was based on Monte Carlo simulations by using the PHITS code. The PHITS simulations show that the system is able to distinguish the PKA isotopes above 0.2-0.3 MeV/nucleon for A=2030 amu; the PKA mass identification thresholds decrease to 0.1 MeV/nucleon for PKAs lighter than 20 amu. The detection system will be tested in the summer of 2017, and the test results will be presented at the conference.

Measurement and mechanism investigation of negative and positive muon-induced upsets in 65-nm Bulk SRAMs

Liao, W.*; Hashimoto, Masanori*; Manabe, Seiya*; Watanabe, Yukinobu*; Abe, Shinichiro; Nakano, Keita*; Sato, Hikaru*; Kin, Tadahiro*; Hamada, Koji*; Tampo, Motonobu*; et al.

IEEE Transactions on Nuclear Science, 65(8), p.1734 - 1741, 2018/08

https://doi.org/10.1109/TNS.2018.2825469

Soft error induced by secondary cosmic-ray muon is concerned since susceptibility of semiconductor device to soft error increases with the scaling of technology. In this study, we have performed irradiation tests of muons on 65-nm bulk CMOS SRAM in the Japan Proton Accelerator Research Complex (J-PARC) and measured soft error rate (SER) to investigate mechanism of muon-induced soft errors. It was found that SER by negative muon increases above 0.5 V supply voltage, although SER by positive muon increases monotonically as the supply voltage lowers. SER by negative muon also increases with forward body bias. In addition, negative muon causes large multiple cell upset (MCU) of more than 20 bits and the ratio of MCU events to all the events is 66% at 1.2V supply voltage. These tendencies indicate that parasitic bipolar action (PBA) is highly possible to contribute to SER by negative muon. Experimental data are analyzed by PHITS. It was found that negative muon can deposit larger charge than positive muon, and such events that can deposit large charge may trigger PBA.

2018 Annual Meeting of Japan Atomic Energy Society, Joint Session of Nuclear Data Subcommittee and Sigma Special Advisory Committee; Present status and future of nuclear data evaluation code in Japan, 4; Role and improvement of nuclear reaction models in the PHITS code

Hashimoto, Shintaro; Sato, Tatsuhiko; Iwamoto, Yosuke; Ogawa, Tatsuhiko; Furuta, Takuya; Abe, Shinichiro; Niita, Koji*

Kaku Deta Nyusu (Internet), (120), p.26 - 34, 2018/06

http://www.aesj.or.jp/~ndd/ndnews/No120.html

Particle and heavy-ion transport code system PHITS has been used for calculations of radiation shielding in accelerator facilities. PHITS describes physical phenomena induced by radiation as combination of transport and collision processes. The collision process including nuclear reactions is simulated by the three-step calculation: a generation of a reaction, pre-equilibrium, and compound processes. In the simulation, many physics models are used. This report explains roles of the models in PHITS and shows their developments we recently performed.

Background radiation monitoring using manned helicopter for establishment of technique of nuclear emergency response in the fiscal year 2016 (Contract research)

Sanada, Yukihisa; Mori, Airi; Iwai, Takeyuki; Seguchi, Eisaku; Matsunaga, Yuki*; Kawabata, Tomoki; Toyoda, Masayuki*; Tobita, Shinichiro*; Hiraga, Shogo; Sato, Yoshiharu; et al.

JAEA-Technology 2017-035, 69 Pages, 2018/02

JAEA-Technology-2017-035.pdf:32.92MB

By the nuclear disaster of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station (FDNPS), Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), caused by the East Japan earthquake and the following tsunami occurred on March 11, 2011, a large amount of radioactive materials was released from the NPS. After the nuclear disaster, airborne radiation monitoring using manned helicopter was conducted around FDNPS. We carried out the background monitoring around the nuclear power stations of the whole country to apply a technique of the airborne radiation monitoring that is cultivated in Fukushima as a technology of nuclear emergency response. This result of the aerial radiation monitoring using the manned helicopter around Ooi, Takahama and Ikata Nuclear Power Station and in the fiscal 2016 were summarized in the report. In addition, technical issues were described.

Cutting operation of simulated fuel assembly heating examination by AWJ

Abe, Yuta; Nakagiri, Toshio; Watatani, Satoshi*; Maruyama, Shinichiro*

JAEA-Technology 2017-023, 46 Pages, 2017/10

JAEA-Technology-2017-023.pdf:8.01MB

This is a report on Abrasive Water Jet (AWJ) cutting work carried out on specimen, which was used for Simulated Fuel Assembly Heating Examination by Collaborative Laboratories for Advanced Decommissioning Science (CLADS) molten core behavior analysis group in February 2016. The simulated fuel assembly is composed of Zirconia for the outer crucible/simulated fuel, stainless steel for the control blade and Zircaloy (Zr) for the cladding tube/channel box. Therefore, it is necessary to cut at once substances having a wide range of fracture toughness and hardness. Moreover, it is a large specimen with an approximate size of 300 mm. In addition, epoxy resin has high stickiness, making it more difficult to cut. Considering these effects, AWJ cutting was selected. The following two points were devised, and this specimen could be cut with AWJ. If it was not possible to cut at one time like a molten portion of boride, it was repeatedly cut. By using Abrasive Suspension Jet (ASJ) system with higher cutting ability than Abrasive Injection Jet (AIJ, conventional method) system, cutting time was shortened. As a result of this work, the cutting method in Simulated Fuel Assembly Heating Examination was established. Incidentally, in the cutting operation, when the cutting ability was lost at the tip of the AWJ, a curved cut surface, which occurs when the jet flowed away from the feeding direction, could be confirmed at the center of the test body. From the next work, to improve the cutting efficiency, we propose adding a mechanism such as turning the cutting member itself for re-cutting from the exit side of the jet and appropriate traverse speed to protect cut surface.

Technical basis of accident tolerant fuel updated under a Japanese R&D project

Yamashita, Shinichiro; Nagase, Fumihisa; Kurata, Masaki; Nozawa, Takashi; Watanabe, Seiichi*; Kirimura, Kazuki*; Kakiuchi, Kazuo*; Kondo, Takao*; Sakamoto, Kan*; Kusagaya, Kazuyuki*; et al.

Proceedings of 2017 Water Reactor Fuel Performance Meeting (WRFPM 2017) (USB Flash Drive), 10 Pages, 2017/09

In Japan, the research and development (R&D) project on accident tolerant fuel and other components (ATFs) of light water reactors (LWRs) has been initiated in 2015 for establishing technical basis of ATFs. The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) has coordinated and carried out this ATF R&D project in cooperation with power plant providers, fuel venders and universities for making the best use of the experiences, knowledges in commercial uses of zirconium-base alloys (Zircaloy) in LWRs. ATF candidate materials under consideration in the project are FeCrAl steel strengthened by dispersion of fine oxide particles(FeCrAl-ODS) and silicon carbide (SiC) composite, and are expecting to endure severe accident conditions in the reactor core for a longer period of time than the Zircaloy while maintaining or improving fuel performance during normal operations. In this paper, the progresses of the R&D project are reported.

The Applicability of SiC-SiC fuel cladding to conventional PWR power plant

Furumoto, Kenichiro*; Watanabe, Seiichi*; Yamamoto, Teruhisa*; Teshima, Hideyuki*; Yamashita, Shinichiro; Saito, Hiroaki; Shirasu, Noriko

Proceedings of 2017 Water Reactor Fuel Performance Meeting (WRFPM 2017) (USB Flash Drive), 10 Pages, 2017/09

http://www.wrfpm2017.org/upload/draft_file/F-225-PD2.pdf

Since 2015, Mitsubishi Nuclear Fuel (MNF) has joined in a Japanese R&D project of ATF founded by the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) as a subcontractor to Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) which is the prime contractor to METI. In this program, MNF plans to evaluate an influence of Silicon Carbide (SiC) composite cladding upon fuel rod behavior in current pressurized water reactors (PWR). This paper reports the evaluation result of the applicability of fuel rod with SiC composite cladding for a conventional PWR. For the applicability evaluations of SiC composite to conventional PWR, both of analytical evaluations and out-of-pile tests for SiC composite were conducted. Analytical evaluations were performed by Mitsubishi's own fuel rod design code and the fuel rod behavior evaluation code developed by JAEA. These codes were modified to evaluate the behavior of the fuel rod with SiC composite cladding. As out-of-pile tests, thermal diffusivity measurement and autoclave corrosion test for SiC composite samples were performed. Test apparatus were developed for evaluation of performance of SiC composite under the condition simulated design basis accident (DBA).

Features of PHITS version 2.88

Sato, Tatsuhiko; Iwamoto, Yosuke; Hashimoto, Shintaro; Ogawa, Tatsuhiko; Furuta, Takuya; Abe, Shinichiro; Kai, Takeshi; Matsuda, Norihiro; Iwase, Hiroshi*; Niita, Koji*

Hoshasen, 43(2), p.55 - 58, 2017/05

Particle and Heavy Ion Transport code System, PHITS, has been developed under the collaboration of several institutes in Japan and Europe. It can deal with the transport of nearly all particles up to 1 TeV (per nucleon for ion) using various nuclear reaction models and data libraries. More than 2,500 registered researchers and technicians have used this system for various applications such as accelerator design, radiation shielding and protection, medical physics, and space- and geo-sciences. This paper summarizes the physics models and functions recently implemented in PHITS, between versions 2.52 and 2.88.

Implementation of muon interaction models in PHITS

Abe, Shinichiro; Sato, Tatsuhiko

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 54(1), p.101 - 110, 2017/01

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2016.1210043

There are several researches for application of muons, e.g. the visualization of inner-structure of nuclear reactors by using high-energy cosmic-ray muons, nuclear transmutation of long-lived fission products (LLFPs) and nondestructive elemental analysis by using low-energy negative muon. In this study, we construct models for muon interactions (i.e., bremsstrahlung, electron-positron pair production, muon photonuclear interaction, and negative muon capture reaction) and implement them into PHITS in order to make PHITS available for investigations of muon application. The improved PHITS agrees well with experimental data not only for the vertical intensities of cosmic-ray muons in water and standard rock, but also for neutron production by muon photonuclear interaction and negative muon capture reaction. The improved PHITS can also reproduce the cross-section of radionuclide production by muons passing through a concrete wall very well. These results indicate the applicability of the improved PHITS to the shielding design of muon facilities in which estimations of attenuation length and induced radioactivity are important.