An updated nuclear criticality slide rule (original) (raw)
Related papers
EPJ Web of Conferences, 2017
AWE (UK), IRSN (France), LLNL (USA) and ORNL (USA) began a long term collaboration effort in 2015 to update the nuclear criticality Slide Rule for the emergency response to a nuclear criticality accident. This document, published almost 20 years ago, gives order of magnitude estimates of key parameters, such as number of fissions and doses (neutron and gamma), useful for emergency response teams and public authorities. This paper will present, firstly the motivation and the long term objectives for this update, then the overview of the initial configurations for updated calculations and preliminary results obtained with modern 3D codes.
Slide Rule for Rapid Response Estimation of Radiological Dose from Criticality Accidents
This paper describes a functional slide rule that provides a readily usable �in-hand� method for estimating nuclear criticality accident information from sliding graphs, thereby permitting (1) the rapid estimation of pertinent criticality accident information without laborious or sophisticated calculations in a nuclear criticality emergency situation, (2) the appraisal of potential fission yields and external personnel radiation exposures for facility safety analyses, and (3) a technical basis for emergency preparedness and training programs at nonreactor nuclear facilities. The slide rule permits the estimation of neutron and gamma dose rates and integrated doses based upon estimated fission yields, distance from the fission source, and time-after criticality accidents for five different critical systems. Another sliding graph permits the; estimation of critical solution fission yields based upon fissile material concentration, critical vessel geometry, and solution addition ra...
New Improved Nuclear Data for Nuclear Criticality and Safety
2011
The Geel Electron Linear Accelerator (GELINA) was used to measure neutron total and capture cross sections of {sup 182,183,184,186}W and {sup 63,65}Cu in the energy range from 100 eV to â200 keV using the time-of-flight method. GELINA is the only high-power white neutron source with excellent timing resolution and ideally suited for these experiments. Concerns about the use of existing cross-section data in nuclear criticality calculations using Monte Carlo codes and benchmarks were a prime motivator for the new cross-section measurements. To support the Nuclear Criticality Safety Program, neutron cross-section measurements were initiated using GELINA at the EC-JRC-IRMM. Concerns about data deficiencies in some existing cross-section evaluations from libraries such as ENDF/B, JEFF, or JENDL for nuclear criticality calculations were the prime motivator for new cross-section measurements. Over the past years many troubles with existing nuclear data have emerged, such as problems relat...
Influence of evaluated data of fission product poisons on criticality
Progress in Nuclear Energy, 2009
The main objective of this research is to study the influence of cross-section differences of fission product poisons among various newly released evaluated cross-section libraries ENDFB-VI.8, JENDL3.2, JEF2.2, IAEA, ENDFB-VII and JEFF3.1 on criticality of an MTR type research reactor. The effect of cross-sections of poisons on the reactivity was studied with the help of WIMSD and CITATION codes. Various cross-section libraries were used in SARC (System for Analysis of Reactor Core) code for the fuel cycle analysis. It was found that the negative reactivity induced due to 135 Xe for the equilibrium core is around 36.00 mk whereas for 149 Sm it ranges from 6.65 to 7.06 mk. The three libraries (JENDL3.2, IAEA and ENDFB-VII) resulted in small increase in the Xenon worth as compared to the other three libraries. For Samarium, JEFF3.1 gives the highest worth whereas ENDFB-VI.8 gives the least worth among the six libraries.
This section contains the description of related engineering and analytical processes that are used generally in nuclear engineering related to the design and operation of nuclear processes. Chapters 19 and 20 describe the safety evaluations that are used for nuclear facilities. Chapter 19 introduces the risk assessment and safety analysis process that is used for nuclear reactors that are licensed in the United States by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). This process has evolved from a relatively simple safety analysis used in the 1950s to a detailed risk assessment process that is used today. Chapter 20 describes the process used in the United States by the Department of Energy for safety analysis of its facilities. It is more prescriptive and less probability and risk based than the process used by the NRC.