Water-Moderated U(4.31)O₂ Fuel Rod Lattices Containing Rhodium Foils

Technical Report · Wed Sep 26 00:00:00 EDT 2018

DOI:https://doi.org/10.2172/1474022· OSTI ID:1474022

Harms, Gary A. ^[1]

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1. Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)

The US Department of Energy Nuclear Energy Research Initiative (NERI) funded the Burnup Credit Critical Experiment (BUCCX) at Sandia National Laboratories. The BUCCX was designed to investigate the effect of fission product materials on critical systems. The BUCCX assembly was a water-moderated and -reflected array of Zircaloy-clad triangular-pitched U(4.31%)0₂ fuel elements. Some of the fuel elements could be opened to allow placement of experiment materials between the fuel pellets in the element. The ten BUCCX critical experiments reported here test the effect of the fission product rhodium on the assembly. The calculated reactivity worth of the rhodium in the experiments ranged from 0% for cases with no rhodium to a maximum of 3.5% of k_eff.

• Research Organization: Sandia National Laboratories (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-94AL85000; NA0003525
• OSTI ID: 1474022
• Report Number(s): SAND--2018-10524R; 668097
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

103-1-
water-reflected
11 NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS
Zircaloy-4
acceptable
array
critical experiment
fission product
fuel rods
low enriched
tc1n rhodium
triangular pitch
uranium
uranium dioxide
water-moderated