PLUTONIUM PRODUCTION IN NPD: A COMPARISON BETWEEN EXPERIMENT AND CALCULATION

Technical Report · Thu Jul 01 00:00:00 EDT 1971

OSTI ID:4734885

Duret, M F; Griffiths, J ^[1]; Bir, R; Chabrillac, M; Vidal, R ^[2]

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1. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., Chalk River, Ontario (Canada). Chalk River Nuclear Labs.
2. CEA Centre d'Etudes Nucleaires de Saclay, 91 - Gif-sur-Yvette (France). Dept. de Physique des Reacteurs et Mathematiques Appliquees

The Canadian Nuclear Power Demonstration Reactor (NPD) is a heavy water cooled an moderated, horizontal pressure tube reactor which has operated at a power level of about 25 MW(e) since 1962. Most of the fuel is in the form of short (50 cm) bundles of zircaloy-clad, natural UO{sub 2} fuel pins in a 19-element circular array. In 1968 a series of eight of these bundles with irradiations covering the range of 1000-10000 MWd/tU was mass spectrometrically analyzed by the CEA in France. The bundles were selected to have an irradiation history typical of an unperturbed CANDU-type reactor with bi-directional on-power fuelling. In particular, none of the bundles spent significant time in 'non-standard' positions near booster rods or experimental fuel bundles, which might perturb the neutron spectrum. Gross gamma-ray measurements were made on each pin to check burn-up homogeneity and so that representative pins could be selected. Burnup values have been determined from the {sup 235}U/{sup 238}U ratios, and ratios of other isotopic abundances have been compared to predictions made using both Canadian and French methods of lattice calculation. In general, the agreement is good. Agreement with detailed compositions within the bundle is slightly less satisfactory than that for bundle average compositions; nevertheless, the results demonstrate our ability to predict the course of fuel burnup in CANDU-type reactors up to at least 10000 MWd/tU.

• Research Organization: Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., Chalk River (Ontario). Chalk River Nuclear Labs.
• NSA Number: NSA-25-060093
• OSTI ID: 4734885
• Report Number(s): AECL-3995
• Resource Relation: Other Information: UNCL. Orig. Receipt Date: 31-DEC-71
• Country of Publication: Canada
• Language: English

Related Subjects

N38170* -Power Reactor Development-Operation & Economics
N20110 -Chemistry-Analytical & Separations Chemistry-Chemical Procedures
BURNUP
CANDU-TYPE REACTOR
ERRORS
FUELS
NPD
PLUTONIUM
PRODUCTION
NPD REACTOR/fuel burnup in
methods for analysis of
(E/T)
REACTORS
CANDU-TYPE/fuel burnup in
methods for analysis of
(E/T)
REACTOR FUELS/burnup in heavy water reactors
methods for analysis of
(E/T)