A Comparison of Measured and Calculated Decay Heat for Spent Fuel Near 2.5 years Cooling Time
- Hanford Engineering Development Laboratory, Richland, WA (United States)
A comparison of calculated and measured decay heat values for four Turkey Point Unit 3 Region 4 spent fuel assemblies was made. In most cases excellent agreement was obtained and provides additional confidence in the prediction of spent fuel performance. Measured values were obtained from a HEDL calorimeter at the Engine Maintenance Assembly and Disassembly (EMAD) facility located in Nevada. Calculated values were obtained with ORIGEN2, an updated version of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory code, ORIGEN. The four measurements were made between April 1, and July 9, 1980 and include decay times between 864 and 963 days after reactor discharge. For three of the assemblies, D34, D15, and D22, calculated values were within 6% of the measured values. A larger difference of 12.3% for assembly D04 may be a consequence of experimental difficulties. These differences can be compared with an experimental uncertainty of 5% and a calculational uncertainty of 8.65%. The comparison also indicates that the ORIGEN2 code gives better values than the older ORIGEN code which gave values nearly 85 higher, at least near the 2.5 year cooling times studied here. Finally, the need for a proper modeling of the burnup history was re-emphasized. However, it is demonstrated that detailed power fluctuations are of little concern.
- Research Organization:
- Hanford Engineering Development Laboratory, Richland, WA (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE)
- DOE Contract Number:
- AC06-76FF02170
- OSTI ID:
- 12477603
- Report Number(s):
- HEDL--7202
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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