Further Evaluation of the Neutron Resonance Transmission Analysis (NRTA) Technique for Assaying Plutonium in Spent Fuel
This is an end-of-year report (Fiscal Year (FY) 2011) for the second year of effort on a project funded by the National Nuclear Security Administration's Office of Nuclear Safeguards (NA-241). The goal of this project is to investigate the feasibility of using Neutron Resonance Transmission Analysis (NRTA) to assay plutonium in commercial light-water-reactor spent fuel. This project is part of a larger research effort within the Next-Generation Safeguards Initiative (NGSI) to evaluate methods for assaying plutonium in spent fuel, the Plutonium Assay Challenge. The second-year goals for this project included: (1) assessing the neutron source strength needed for the NRTA technique, (2) estimating count times, (3) assessing the effect of temperature on the transmitted signal, (4) estimating plutonium content in a spent fuel assembly, (5) providing a preliminary assessment of the neutron detectors, and (6) documenting this work in an end of the year report (this report). Research teams at Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), and at several universities are also working to investigate plutonium assay methods for spent-fuel safeguards. While the NRTA technique is well proven in the scientific literature for assaying individual spent fuel pins, it is a newcomer to the current NGSI efforts studying Pu assay method techniques having just started in March 2010; several analytical techniques have been under investigation within this program for two to three years or more. This report summarizes work performed over a nine month period from January-September 2011 and is to be considered a follow-on or add-on report to our previous published summary report from December 2010 (INL/EXT-10-20620).
- Research Organization:
- Idaho National Lab. (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- DOE - NA
- DOE Contract Number:
- DE-AC07-05ID14517
- OSTI ID:
- 1033902
- Report Number(s):
- INL/EXT-11-23391; TRN: US1200677
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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