Verification of Cell-Homogenized Whole-Core Transport Calculations in Actual PWR Core Geometry

Conference · Sun Nov 12 04:00:00 EST 2000

OSTI ID:786845

Yamamoto, Akio; Tatsumi, Masahiro; Kimoto, Tatsuya; Kosaka, Shinya; Saji, Etsuro

In this paper, a cell-homogenized whole-core transport calculation is applied to a pressurized water reactor (PWR) core and its prediction accuracy on reactivity and power distribution is verified in comparison with cell-heterogeneous whole-core transport calculation results obtained by the method of characteristics. Recent progress in common computer hardware promotes continuous improvements on core calculation methods. Among several different approaches, a three-dimensional pin-by-pin (fine-mesh) core calculation is considered as one of the candidates of advanced methods. In general, although the fine-mesh core calculation explicitly treats each individual pin, it still has three approximations: cell-homogenization, low-level transport theory (usually the SPN or the diffusion approximation) and few-group treatment. Therefore, the impact of these approximations on core characteristics should be evaluated to confirm the feasibility of the three-dimensional fine-mesh core calculation method. This paper focuses on two former approximations, and the impact of these approximations is evaluated.

• Research Organization: Nuclear Fuel Industries Ltd., Osaka (JP); Toden Software Inc., Tokyo (JP)
• Sponsoring Organization: none (US)
• OSTI ID: 786845
• Report Number(s): none; ISSN 0003-018X; CODEN TANSAO; ISSN 0003-018X; CODEN TANSAO
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS
99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS
ACCURACY
COMPUTER CALCULATIONS
HETEROGENEOUS REACTOR CORES
HOMOGENIZATION METHODS
MULTIGROUP THEORY
POWER DISTRIBUTION
PWR TYPE REACTORS
RADIATION TRANSPORT
TRANSPORT THEORY
VERIFICATION