Multipurpose Outage at a Midsize, Resource-Limited Nonpower Reactor
The University of Florida Training Reactor (UFTR) is a light water-cooled, graphite and light water-moderated, modified Argonaut-type reactor licensed to operate at steady-state power levels up to 100 kW. The UFTR was subject to a unique and lengthy voluntary outage beginning in May 1998 following several months of gradual increases in the normal critical position totaling {approx}0.002 {Delta}k/k. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) was updated periodically on the facility status and visited the facility twice during the outage and once since restart to normal operations on August 17, 1999. Various potential causes of this reactivity anomaly were identified. After investigation, each of these causes was eliminated with no specific cause ever identified. Despite all the inherent limitations and especially because of the difficulty of core access, this entire outage was conducted with the perspective of relicensing in 2002. Areas specifically addressed included compensating efforts to preclude loss of user clientele, acquisition of data for facilitating the upcoming conversion from high-enriched uranium (HEU) to low-enriched uranium (LEU), and development of a surveillance plan relicensing database to support the planned license renewal. In summary, this nonpower reactor facility with limited staff has been successful in all three areas.
- Research Organization:
- University of Florida, Gainesville, FL (US)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- none (US)
- OSTI ID:
- 786187
- Report Number(s):
- ISSN 0003-018X; CODEN TANSAO; ISSN 0003-018X; CODEN TANSAO; TRN: US0109304
- Resource Relation:
- Conference: 2000 Annual Meeting, San Diego, CA (US), 06/04/2000--06/08/2000; Other Information: Transactions of the American Nuclear Society, Volume 82; PBD: 4 Jun 2000
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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