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Title: The specific ( α ,n) production rate for 234U in UF6

Abstract

Natural, depleted, and low enriched uranium hexafluoride is manufactured and transported on an industrial scale to support commercial nuclear power plant operation. One-way material production and flow is verified by nuclear safeguards inspectorates is by neutron counting. The dominant neutron source term is ( α ,n) production due to 234U which gets enriched/depleted along with 235U. We describe recent efforts to accurately determine the ( α ,n)/s/g of 234U in UF6. This piece of nuclear data is of direct value to the nuclear safeguards community in the science-based verification and assay of bulk uranium hexafluoride. It also provides a benchmark on codes that calculate yield curves for various compounds from cross section data, and hence, provides a scale or normalization constraint on evaluated basic cross section data. Finally, in turn, evaluated basic data allows the yield from other materials to be calculated; for instance, moist uranyl fluoride, which is of interest in holdup measurements.

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [1];  [1];  [1];  [3];  [2];  [1]
  1. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
  2. Los Alamos National Lab. (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States)
  3. Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States); Univ. of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), Los Alamos, NM (United States); Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), Office of Defense Nuclear Nonproliferation
OSTI Identifier:
1484670
Alternate Identifier(s):
OSTI ID: 1636239
Report Number(s):
LA-UR-18-29309
Journal ID: ISSN 0168-9002
Grant/Contract Number:  
89233218CNA000001
Resource Type:
Journal Article: Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research. Section A, Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 954; Journal ID: ISSN 0168-9002
Publisher:
Elsevier
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY; uranium hexafluoride; alpha-neutron reaction; nuclear safeguards

Citation Formats

Croft, Stephen, Favalli, Andrea, Fugate, Glenn A., Gauld, Ian, McElroy, Robert D., Simone, Angela, Swinhoe, Martyn T., and Venkataraman, Ramkumar. The specific (α,n) production rate for 234U in UF6. United States: N. p., 2018. Web. doi:10.1016/j.nima.2018.11.067.
Croft, Stephen, Favalli, Andrea, Fugate, Glenn A., Gauld, Ian, McElroy, Robert D., Simone, Angela, Swinhoe, Martyn T., & Venkataraman, Ramkumar. The specific (α,n) production rate for 234U in UF6. United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2018.11.067
Croft, Stephen, Favalli, Andrea, Fugate, Glenn A., Gauld, Ian, McElroy, Robert D., Simone, Angela, Swinhoe, Martyn T., and Venkataraman, Ramkumar. 2018. "The specific (α,n) production rate for 234U in UF6". United States. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nima.2018.11.067. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1484670.
@article{osti_1484670,
title = {The specific (α,n) production rate for 234U in UF6},
author = {Croft, Stephen and Favalli, Andrea and Fugate, Glenn A. and Gauld, Ian and McElroy, Robert D. and Simone, Angela and Swinhoe, Martyn T. and Venkataraman, Ramkumar},
abstractNote = {Natural, depleted, and low enriched uranium hexafluoride is manufactured and transported on an industrial scale to support commercial nuclear power plant operation. One-way material production and flow is verified by nuclear safeguards inspectorates is by neutron counting. The dominant neutron source term is (α,n) production due to 234U which gets enriched/depleted along with 235U. We describe recent efforts to accurately determine the (α,n)/s/g of 234U in UF6. This piece of nuclear data is of direct value to the nuclear safeguards community in the science-based verification and assay of bulk uranium hexafluoride. It also provides a benchmark on codes that calculate yield curves for various compounds from cross section data, and hence, provides a scale or normalization constraint on evaluated basic cross section data. Finally, in turn, evaluated basic data allows the yield from other materials to be calculated; for instance, moist uranyl fluoride, which is of interest in holdup measurements.},
doi = {10.1016/j.nima.2018.11.067},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/1484670}, journal = {Nuclear Instruments and Methods in Physics Research. Section A, Accelerators, Spectrometers, Detectors and Associated Equipment},
issn = {0168-9002},
number = ,
volume = 954,
place = {United States},
year = {Thu Nov 22 00:00:00 EST 2018},
month = {Thu Nov 22 00:00:00 EST 2018}
}

Journal Article:

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Cited by: 3 works
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