Nuclear data libraries assessment for modelling a small fluoride salt-cooled, high-temperature reactor

• Main Authors: Mohamed H., Lindley B., Parks G.
• Other Authors: 57136356100
• Format: Conference Paper
• Published: American Institute of Physics Inc. 2023

Nuclear data consists of measured or evaluated probabilities of various fundamental physical interactions involving the nuclei of atoms and their properties. Most fluoride salt-cooled high-temperature reactor (FHR) studies that were reviewed do not give detailed information on the data libraries used in their assessments. Therefore, the main objective of this data libraries comparison study is to investigate whether there are any significant discrepancies between main data libraries, namely ENDF/B-VII, JEFF-3.1 and JEF-2.2. Knowing the discrepancies, especially its magnitude, is important and relevant for readers as to whether further cautions are necessary for any future verification or validation processes when modelling an FHR. The study is performed using AMEC's reactor physics software tool, WIMS. The WIMS calculation is simply a 2-D infinite lattice of fuel assembly calculation. The comparison between the data libraries in terms of infinite multiplication factor, kinf and pin power map are presented. Results show that the discrepancy between JEFF-3.1 and ENDF/B-VII libraries is reasonably small but increases as the fuel depletes due to the data libraries uncertainties that are accumulated at each burnup step. Additionally, there are large discrepancies between JEF-2.2 and ENDF/B-VII because of the inadequacy of the JEF-2.2 library.