Analysis of Differential Die Away Instrument Simulated Performance Using Boiling Water Reactor Spent Fuel Assemblies
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
As part of evaluating the performance of various Non-Destructive Assay (NDA) instruments measuring the plutonium content and other information about spent nuclear fuel, the Next Generation of Safeguards Initiative (NGSI) Spent Fuel (SF) Project generated spent fuel libraries containing the composition of spent fuel assemblies originating from various reactors, initial enrichments (IE), burnups (BU), and cooling times (CT). Spent Fuel Library (SFL) number 5 (SFL5), representing Boiling Water Reactor (BWR) assemblies, was created as part of a “Gentleman’s Agreement” with Sweden to examine if the Differential Die Away (DDA) instrument performs similarly for BWR assemblies as for the Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR) ones. The difference between PWRs and BWRs is that BWRs have a large axial variation in moderator density because it is in the form of water at the bottom of the reactor but turns into steam as it gets warmer at the top of the reactor; thus, more plutonium builds up at the bottom of each assembly than at the top. In a PWR, the moderator density varies slightly from the bottom to the top, but since it is pressurized, the changes are not as significant with respect to the burnup and plutonium distributions. BWR assemblies are also typically smaller than PWR ones, which could affect detector performance. Since Sweden has both PWR and BWR assemblies, it is anticipated that we will be deploying the DDA instrument to measure both spent fuel assembly (SFA) types.
- Research Organization:
- Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC52-06NA25396
- OSTI ID:
- 1131010
- Report Number(s):
- LA-UR--14-23276
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
Similar Records
Improved evaluation of safeguards parameters from spent fuel measurements with the Differential Die-Away (DDA) instrument
Simulation of differential die-away instrument’s response to asymmetrically burned spent nuclear fuel
Results of the Swedish spent fuel measurement field trials with the Differential Die-Away Self-Interrogation Instrument
Journal Article
·
Mon Feb 14 19:00:00 EST 2022
· Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research. Section A, Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment
·
OSTI ID:1846913
Simulation of differential die-away instrument’s response to asymmetrically burned spent nuclear fuel
Journal Article
·
Tue Mar 03 19:00:00 EST 2015
· Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research. Section A, Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment
·
OSTI ID:1289709
Results of the Swedish spent fuel measurement field trials with the Differential Die-Away Self-Interrogation Instrument
Journal Article
·
Sun Dec 22 19:00:00 EST 2019
· Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research. Section A, Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment
·
OSTI ID:2346075