Reactor Physics Characterization of the HTR Module with UCO Fuel

Gerhard Strydom

关键词: DESIGN;    FUEL ELEMENTS;    FUEL PARTICLES;    HEAVY METALS;    HELIUM;    PERFORMANCE;    REACTOR PHYSICS;    TEST REACTORS;    URANIUM OXIDES HTR;    NGNP;    UCO characterization;   

DOI  :  10.2172/1009138
RP-ID  :  INL/EXT-10-20521
PID  :  OSTI ID: 1009138
Others  :  TRN: US1101732

学科分类：核能源与工程

美国|英语

来源: SciTech Connect

【 摘 要 】

ABSTRACT The HTR Module [1] is a graphite-moderated, helium cooled pebble bed High Temperature Reactor (HTR) design that has been extensively used as a reference template for the former South African and current Chinese HTR [2] programs. This design utilized spherical fuel elements packed into a dynamic pebble bed, consisting of TRISO coated uranium oxide (UO2) fuel kernels with a U-235 enrichment of 7.8% and a Heavy Metal loading of 7 grams per pebble. The main objective of this study is to compare several important reactor physics and core design parameters for the HTR Module and an identical design utilizing UCO fuel kernels. Fuel kernels of this type are currently being tested in the Idaho National Laboratory???s (INL) Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) as part of the larger Next Generation Nuclear Plant (NGNP) project. The PEBBED-THERMIX [3] code, which was developed specifically for the analysis of pebble bed HTRs, was used to compare the coupled neutronic and thermal fluid performance of the two designs.