MC21 analysis of the nuclear energy agency Monte Carlo performance benchmark problem
- Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory, Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corporation, P. O. Box 1072, Schenectady, NY 12301-1072 (United States)
- Bertis Atomic Power Laboratory, Bechtel Marine Propulsion Corporation, P. O. Box 79, West Mifflin, PA 15122-0079 (United States)
Due to the steadily decreasing cost and wider availability of large scale computing platforms, there is growing interest in the prospects for the use of Monte Carlo for reactor design calculations that are currently performed using few-group diffusion theory or other low-order methods. To facilitate the monitoring of the progress being made toward the goal of practical full-core reactor design calculations using Monte Carlo, a performance benchmark has been developed and made available through the Nuclear Energy Agency. A first analysis of this benchmark using the MC21 Monte Carlo code was reported on in 2010, and several practical difficulties were highlighted. In this paper, a newer version of MC21 that addresses some of these difficulties has been applied to the benchmark. In particular, the confidence-interval-determination method has been improved to eliminate source correlation bias, and a fission-source-weighting method has been implemented to provide a more uniform distribution of statistical uncertainties. In addition, the Forward-Weighted, Consistent-Adjoint-Driven Importance Sampling methodology has been applied to the benchmark problem. Results of several analyses using these methods are presented, as well as results from a very large calculation with statistical uncertainties that approach what is needed for design applications. (authors)
- Research Organization:
- American Nuclear Society, Inc., 555 N. Kensington Avenue, La Grange Park, Illinois 60526 (United States)
- OSTI ID:
- 22105851
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: PHYSOR 2012: Conference on Advances in Reactor Physics - Linking Research, Industry, and Education, Knoxville, TN (United States), 15-20 Apr 2012; Other Information: Country of input: France; 18 refs.
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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