Evaluation of Transport–Burnup Coupling Strategy in Double-Heterogeneity Problem

Yunfei Zhang, Qian Zhang, Yang Zou (), Bo Zhou (), Rui Yan, Guifeng Zhu, Jian Guo and Ao Zhang
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Yunfei Zhang: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Qian Zhang: Laboratory for Advanced Nuclear Energy Theory and Applications, Zhejiang Institute of Modern Physics, Department of Physics, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310058, China
Yang Zou: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Bo Zhou: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Rui Yan: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Guifeng Zhu: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Jian Guo: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China
Ao Zhang: Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 201800, China

Energies, 2024, vol. 17, issue 15, 1-21

Abstract: The simulation of fuel composition requires coupled calculations of neutron transport and burnup. It is generally assumed that the neutron flux density and cross-sections remain constant within a burnup step. However, when there are strong absorber poisons present, the reaction rates of the absorbers change too rapidly over time, necessitating extremely fine step sizes to ensure computational accuracy, which in turn leads to low computational efficiency. As a type of accident tolerant fuel (ATF), fully ceramic micro-encapsulated (FCM) fuel is a promising new type of nuclear fuel. Accelerated algorithms for burnup calculations of FCM fuel containing gadolinium isotopes have been developed based on the ALPHA code, including the projected predictor–corrector (PPC), the log-linear rate (LLR), and the high-order predictor–corrector (HOPC) methods (including CE/LI, CE/QI, LE/LI, and LE/QI). The performances of different algorithms under the two forms of Gd 2 O 3 existence were analyzed. The numerical results show that the LE/QI method performs the best overall. For Gd 2 O 3 existing in both forms, the LE/QI algorithm can maintain accuracy with a burnup step size of up to 1.0 GWd/tU, keeping the infinite multiplication factor k inf within 100 pcm, and it exhibits high accuracy in simulating the atomic number densities of Gd-155 and Gd-157 throughout the burnup process.

Keywords: FCM fuel; Gd 2 O 3; ALPHA; burnup calculation; transport–burnup coupling (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
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