Assessing criticality implications of small angle neutron scattering and porosity misrepresentation in ENDF/B-VIII.1 TSLs for nuclear graphite

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Abstract

This paper investigates the impact of porosity misrepresentation in ENDF/B-VIII.1 graphite thermal scattering law (TSL) evaluations on reactor criticality.Our studies involve inelastic neutron scattering (INS) measurements, transmission measurements, and nuclear criticality calculations.The INS measurements contradict the current TSL assumptions, showing no significant porosity dependence.Transmission measurements reveal discrepancies between TSL predictions and experimental data, highlighting the need for inclusion of small angle neutron scattering (SANS) cross sections.Criticality calculations for various reactor benchmarks (HTR-10, HTTR, and PROTEUS) indicate substantial overestimation in effective multiplication factor (ke f f ) for porous graphite ENDF/B-VIII.1 TSLs due to these porosity modeling inaccuracies.Our research suggests revising current neutron scattering physics to incorporate SANS modeling, to account for accurate treatment of porosity in nuclear graphite, vital for reliable designs of advanced nuclear reactor designs.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings of the International Conference on Physics of Reactors, PHYSOR 2024
PublisherAmerican Nuclear Society
Pages1527-1538
Number of pages12
ISBN (Electronic)9780894487972
DOIs
StatePublished - 2024
Event2024 International Conference on Physics of Reactors, PHYSOR 2024 - San Francisco, United States
Duration: Apr 21 2024Apr 24 2024

Publication series

NameProceedings of the International Conference on Physics of Reactors, PHYSOR 2024

Conference

Conference2024 International Conference on Physics of Reactors, PHYSOR 2024
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CitySan Francisco
Period04/21/2404/24/24

Keywords

  • criticality
  • nuclear graphite
  • porosity
  • reactor benchmarks
  • TSL

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