A comparison of Neutronic Study of 400MW thermal Fast Reactor with Modified CANDLE Burnup Scheme by Using Liquid Sodium, Lead -Bismuth Eutectic and Helium Gas Coolants
Jean Pierre Ndayiragije, Zaki Su^ud, Abdul Waris, Dwi Irwanto

Institut Teknologi Bandung

Abstract

A comparison of Neutronic Study of 400MW thermal Fast Reactor with Modified CANDLE Burnup Scheme by Using Liquid Sodium, Lead -Bismuth Eutectic and Helium Gas Coolants
Jean Pierre Ndayiragije, Zaki Su^ud, Abdul Waris, Dwi Irwanto
1Department of Physics, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia.
2Department of nuclear science and Engineering, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia.
ndayirajeanpierre@gmail.com
Abstract: The choice of the coolant is one of the main technical issues regarding fast reactor design since it determines the design approach and safety, technical and economic characteristics system. In this study, the utilization of liquid Sodium, Lead-Bismuth Eutectic and Helium coolants have been investigated to compare the neutronic analysis of a Fast Reactor with Modified CANDLE (Constant Axial shape of Neutron flux, nuclide densities, and power shape During Life of Energy production) burnup scheme. The study was performed on a reactor with thermal power of 400MWth with a refuelling process every ten years of burnup. In the Modified CANDLE burnup scheme, the active core has been divided into ten regions with the same volume in the radial direction. The first region is contained by fresh natural uranium, and after ten years of burnup, it is moved into the second region and, ten years later, it is shifted to region 3. These movements have been done to all regions. Liquid Sodium, Lead-Bismuth Eutectic and Helium became promising coolants for the fast reactor due to their properties such as high specific heat, thermal conductivity, low viscosity, low corrosive and erosive effects, less likely to be radioactive, low neutron absorption, high boiling point and low melting point. The neutronic calculations have been carried out by using SRAC (Standard Reactor Analysis Code) with JENDL 4.0 as the nuclear data library. Neutronic aspects such as, burn up level, multiplication factor, infinite multiplication factor and conversion ratio are utilized in this study to compare the behaviour of the fast reactor cooled by Liquid Sodium, Lead-Bismuth eutectic, and Helium gas. According to the effective multiplication factor results, the liquid sodium reached criticality more than others. Then liquid sodium is the best coolant compared to the lead-bismuth eutectic and helium gas.

Keywords: effective multiplication factor, coolant, Modified CANDLE, Burn-up level


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Keywords: effective multiplication factor, coolant, Modified CANDLE, Burn-up level

Topic: Nuclear Science and Engineering