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Control of the incore thermionic reactor (ITR) by movable reflector elements

Technical Report ·
OSTI ID:4935885
In the ITR the variations of reactivity due to the burn-up and poisoning by fission products, the hydrogen leakage. or the heating-up of the reactor will be compensated by burnable poisons and by reflector control elements. Furthermore the control elements will be used for the reactor power-regulation and shutdown. Two different reflector element designs were investigated. The first uses revolving reflector drums as in the SNAP concept. Here the control of the reactor is accomplished by varying leakage rates. The second uses rotating control-cylinders which are partly poisoned. Due to the position of the neutron absorber regions the reflector becomes more or less effective for neutrons having epithermal or thermal energy. For both the control drums and the control cylinders the reactivity and power distribution were calculated as a function of the reflector position. The calculations of the control drum worth were performed with the MONTE CARLO method, because of the very complex geometry of the reactor with its rotating reflector elements. Both analog and correlated Monte Carlo were used to estimate values for k/sub eff/ and its change DELTA k. The hereby applied estimation methods were tested by the simulation of several experiments which were done at the ITR critical facility at Julich. (auth)
Research Organization:
Univ., Stuttgart
Sponsoring Organization:
Sponsor not identified
NSA Number:
NSA-29-012182
OSTI ID:
4935885
Report Number(s):
CONF-720613--P1
Country of Publication:
Germany
Language:
English