Study on BC decoupler with burn-up reduction aiming at 1-MW pulsed neutron source

Oi, Motoki; Teshigawara, Makoto; Harada, Masahide; Ikeda, Yujiro

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(7), p.573 - 579, 2019/07

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1604273

In pulsed neutron sources, a neutron absorber called decoupler is attached to the moderator to sharpen the neutron pulses for achieving good neutron energy resolutions. Cadmium and boron carbide (BC) are widely used as the decoupler materials. However, it is difficult to use BC in MW-class spallation neutron sources owing to high burn-up, which decreases cut-off energy and increase of helium gas swelling. To solve these issues, we introduce the concept of pre-decoupler to reduce neutron absorption in the BC decoupler, which is sandwiched by appropriate neutron absorption materials. Then, we study impacts of the pre-decouplers on BC decoupler in terms of burn-up by performing simplified model calculations. It is shown that neutron absorption in BC is reduced by 60% by using a Cd pre-decoupler without neutron intensity penalty. Moreover, helium gas swelling in BC is restrained to be one-third of the value when not using the pre-decoupler.

Visualizing an ignition process of hydrogen jets containing sodium mist by high-speed imaging

Doi, Daisuke; Seino, Hiroshi; Miyahara, Shinya*; Uno, Masayoshi*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(6), p.521 - 532, 2019/06

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1599743

Model updates and performance evaluations on fuel performance code FEMAXI-8 for light water reactor fuel analysis

Udagawa, Yutaka; Amaya, Masaki

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(6), p.461 - 470, 2019/06

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1595766

no abstracts in English

Calculation of low-energy electron antineutrino spectra emitted from nuclear reactors with consideration of fuel burn-up

Riyana, E. S.*; Suda, Shoya*; Ishibashi, Kenji*; Matsuura, Hideaki*; Katakura, Junichi*; Sun, G. M.*; Katano, Yoshiaki

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(5), p.369 - 375, 2019/05

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00223131.2017.1291370

Nuclear reactors produce a great number of electron antineutrinos mainly from beta-decay chains of fission products. Such neutrinos have energies mostly in MeV range. We are interested in neutrinos in a region of keV, since they may have information on fuel burn-up and may be detected in future with advanced measurement technology. We calculate reactor antineutrino spectra especially in the low energy region. In this work we present neutrino spectra from various reactors such as typical PWR reactor and others types of reactors for comparison. Our result shows the electron antineutrino flux in the low energy region increases with burn-up of nuclear fuel by accumulated nuclides with low Q values in beta decay.

Phenomenological level density model with hybrid parameterization of deformed and spherical state densities

Furutachi, Naoya*; Minato, Futoshi; Iwamoto, Osamu

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(5), p.412 - 424, 2019/05

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1588801

A phenomenological level density model that has different level density parameter sets for the state densities of the spherical and the deformed states, and the optimization of the parameters using the experimental data of the average s-wave neutron resonance spacing are presented. The transition to the spherical state from the deformed one is described using the parameters derived from a microscopic nuclear structure calculation. The nuclear reaction calculation has been performed by the statistical model using the present level density. Resulting cross sections for various reactions with the spherical, deformed and transitional target nuclei shows a fair agreement with the experimental data, which indicates the effectiveness of the present model. The role of the rotational collective enhancement in the calculations of those cross sections is also discussed.

An Interpretation of Fukushima-Daiichi Unit 3 plant data covering the two-week accident-progression phase based on correction for pressure data

Sato, Ikken

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(5), p.394 - 411, 2019/05

https://doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1588798

Water columns were adopted in the pressure measurement system of Fukushima-Daiichi Unit-3. Part of these water columns evaporated during the accident condition jeopardizing correct understanding on actual pressure. Through comparison of RPV (Reactor Pressure Vessel) and S/C pressures with D/W pressure, such water-column effect was evaluated. Correction for this effect was developed enabling clarification of slight pressure difference among RPV, S/C and D/W. This information was then integrated with other available data such as, water level, CAMS and environmental dose rate, into an interpretation of accident focusing on RPV and PCV pressurization/depressurization and radioactive material release to environment. It is suggested that dryout of in-vessel and ex-vessel debris was likely causing pressure decrease. S/C water poured into pedestal heated by relocated debris was the likely cause of pressurization. Cyclic reflooding of pedestal debris and dryout was likely.

Estimation method of systematic uncertainties in Monte Carlo particle transport simulation based on analysis of variance

Hashimoto, Shintaro; Sato, Tatsuhiko

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(4), p.345 - 354, 2019/04

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2019.1585989

Particle transport simulations based on the Monte Carlo method have been applied to shielding calculations. Estimation of not only statistical uncertainty related to the number of trials but also systematic one induced by unclear physical quantities is required to confirm the reliability of calculated results. In this study, we applied a method based on analysis of variance to shielding calculations. We proposed random- and three-condition methods. The first one determines randomly the value of the unclear quantity, while the second one uses only three values: the default value, upper and lower limits. The systematic uncertainty can be estimated adequately by the random-condition method, though it needs the large computational cost. The three-condition method can provide almost the same estimate as the random-condition method when the effect of the variation is monotonic. We found criterion to confirm convergence of the systematic uncertainty as the number of trials increases.

Chemical reaction kinetics dataset of Cs-I-B-Mo-O-H system for evaluation of fission product chemistry under LWR severe accident conditions

Miyahara, Naoya; Miwa, Shuhei; Horiguchi, Naoki; Sato, Isamu*; Osaka, Masahiko

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(2), p.228 - 240, 2019/02

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2018.1544939

In order to improve LWR source term under severe accident conditions, the first version of a fission product (FP) chemistry database named "ECUME" was developed. The ECUME is intended to include major chemical reactions and their effective kinetic constants for representative SA sequences. It is expected that the ECUME can serve as a fundamental basis from which FP chemical models in the SA analysis codes can be elaborated. The implemented chemical reactions in the first version were those for representative gas species in Cs-I-B-Mo-O-H system. The chemical reaction kinetic constants were evaluated from either literature data or calculated values using ab-initio calculations. The sample chemical reaction calculation using the presently constructed dataset showed meaningful kinetics effects at 1000 K. Comparison of the chemical equilibrium compositions by using the dataset with those by chemical equilibrium calculations has shown rather good consistency for the representative Cs-I-B-Mo-O-H species. From these results, it was concluded that the present dataset should be useful to evaluate FP chemistry in Cs-I-B-Mo-O-H system under LWA SA conditions.

Unified description of the fission probability for highly excited nuclei

Iwamoto, Hiroki; Meigo, Shinichiro

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(2), p.160 - 171, 2019/02

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2018.1539351

We present a new model to describe the fission probability of the high-energy fission model, as deduced from the intranuclear cascade calculation with the Intra-Nuclear Cascade model of Lige (INCL) version 4.6 and Prokofiev's phenomenological systematics of the proton-induced fission cross sections. This model is implemented in the de-excitation model of the Generalized Evaporation Model (GEM), and applied to Monte Carlo spallation reaction simulation using the Particle and Heavy Ion Transport code System (PHITS). Comparing with experimental data for subactinide nuclei shows that this model can provide a unified prediction of the proton-, neutron-, and deuteron-induced fission cross sections with markedly improved accuracy. The calculated fission fragments tend to shift to higher mass numbers. To account for the isotopic distributions of fission fragments within the framework of a coupled INCL/GEM, modification of INCL is required, especially for description of the highly-excited states of residual nuclei.

Development of a stochastic biokinetic method and its application to internal dose estimation for insoluble cesium-bearing particles

Manabe, Kentaro; Matsumoto, Masaki*

Journal of Nuclear Science and Technology, 56(1), p.78 - 86, 2019/01

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/00223131.2018.1523756

If an insoluble cesium-bearing particle is incorporated into the human body, the radioactivity will move as a single particle. In this case, it is impossible to estimate the number of disintegrations by considering the average behavior of countless nuclei. Then, a method was developed to simulate the behavior of the particle stochastically; and a biokinetic model was constructed to consider the characteristics of insoluble particles. Combination of the method and the model enables to estimate the number of disintegrations, and consequently the internal doses considering the stochastic behavior of the single cesium particle. We evaluated a probability density function of committed equivalent and effective doses and its 99th percentile value and arithmetic mean by repeating the above described procedure, and compared them to the reference values based on the existing models. As a result, the 99th percentile value of committed effective doses was 70 times the reference value when the number of incorporated particles was one, and consequently the dose level was quite low. When the exposure level is 1 mSv in committed effective dose, the uncertainty originating in the insolubility of cesium particles was negligibly small.