Feasibility Study for the Fast Periodic Pulsed Reactor with UO2 Fuel

Liang Zhang,Lipeng Wang,Lixin Chen,Sen Chen,Tengyue Ma,Da Li,Xinbiao Jiang,Xinyi Zhang

doi:10.3389/fenrg.2021.702952

Abstract

In order to study the feasibility of the fast periodic pulsed reactor with UO2 as fuel (abbreviated as FPPRU), the core models with different load schemes are designed. Neutronic characteristics of two typical design schemes are compared, and the better design scheme is determined. The critical search method is established for analyzing the reactor dynamics. Furthermore, the theoretical estimation formulas are derived to study the factors affecting the reactor dynamics clearly and intuitively. The reactor dynamics of the fast periodic pulsed reactor with UO2 and PuO2 as fuel are compared. The thermal hydraulic characteristic of FPPRU is studied with the sub-channel model. The results show that the design scheme of the FPPRU meets the demand of neutronics and thermal hydraulics safety. Meanwhile, the pulse parameter quality of the FPPRU with UO2 as fuel is not as good as that of IBR-2 with PuO2 as fuel.

Highlights

The fast periodic pulsed reactor uses rotating reflectors to introduce periodic reactivity, making the core generate power pulses at a certain frequency
The sodium cooling fast periodic pulsed reactor with UO2 as fuel (FPPRU) is designed, and the feasibility is studied in this article
The theoretical estimation formula which could clearly show the difference between the pulse parameters of FPPRU1 and IBR-2 is derived

Summary

Introduction

The fast periodic pulsed reactor uses rotating reflectors to introduce periodic reactivity, making the core generate power pulses at a certain frequency. The fast periodic pulsed reactor IBR-2 had been built in 1984 in the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research of Russia and had retired in 2006. The modernized reactor IBR-2M was designed and built and was put into use in 2011 (Dragunov et al, 2012). After successful operation for as long as 37 years, the fast periodic pulsed reactor IBR-2/ IBR-2M has been proven to be safe. Lots of research has been carried out in a wide range of scientific fields, including condensed physics, biology, chemistry, material, geophysics, new superconductivity, and heavy metal nuclear database (Marina, 2011; Ata-Allah et al, 2016; Avdeev et al, 2019; Badawy et al, 2020; Golovin et al, 2020; Turchenko et al, 2020)

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Conclusion