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Criticality calculations of the Very High Temperature Reactor Critical Assembly benchmark with Serpent and SCALE/KENO-VI

Journal Article · · Annals of Nuclear Energy
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [3];  [1];  [1]
  1. Gesellschaft für Anlagen- und Reaktorsicherheit gGmbH (GRS), Garching (Germany)
  2. Texas A & M University, College Station, TX (United States)
  3. Idaho National Laboratory (INL), Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations
Within the framework of the IAEA Coordinated Research Project on HTGR Uncertainty Analysis in Modeling, criticality calculations of the Very High Temperature Critical Assembly experiment were performed as the validation reference to the prismatic MHTGR-350 lattice calculations. Criticality measurements performed at several temperature points at this Japanese graphite-moderated facility were recently included in the International Handbook of Evaluated Reactor Physics Benchmark Experiments and represent one of the few data sets available for the validation of HTGR lattice physics. Here, this work compares VHTRC criticality simulations utilizing the Monte Carlo codes Serpent and SCALE/KENO-VI. Reasonable agreement was found between Serpent and KENO-VI, but only the use of the latest ENDF cross section library release, namely the ENDF/B-VII.1 library, led to an improved match with the measured data. Furthermore, the fourth beta release of SCALE 6.2/KENO-VI showed significant improvements from the current SCALE 6.1.2 version, compared to the experimental values and Serpent.
Research Organization:
Idaho National Laboratory, Idaho Falls, ID (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
German Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy; USDOE; USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP); USDOE Office of Nuclear Energy (NE)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC07-05ID14517
OSTI ID:
1259313
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1358753
OSTI ID: 22554003
Report Number(s):
INL/JOU--15-34867; PII: S0306454915300177
Journal Information:
Annals of Nuclear Energy, Journal Name: Annals of Nuclear Energy Journal Issue: C Vol. 90; ISSN 0306-4549
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (3)

The Serpent Monte Carlo code: Status, development and applications in 2013 journal August 2015
Impact of Revised Thermal Neutron Capture Cross Section of Carbon Stored in JENDL-4.0 on HTTR Criticality Calculation journal July 2011
A Model for Neutron Scattering Off Heavy Isotopes That Accounts for Thermal Agitation Effects journal March 1991

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Related Subjects

11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS
97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING
HTGR
Nuclear Criticality Safety Program (NCSP)
SCALE/KENO-VI
VHTRC
serpent