Fast-Neutron Hodoscope at TREAT: Methods for Quantitative Determination of Fuel Dispersal

Volpi, A. De; Fink, C.L.; Marsh, Gerald E.; Rhodes, E. A.; Stanford, G.S.

doi:10.13182/nt82-1

Cited by 27 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…The TREAT fast-neutron hodoscope { [14], [15]} provided a third way of indicating the ratio of TREAT core power to test-fuel power, by measuring the level of thermal neutron flux emanating from the reactor core and simultaneously measuring the level of fast neutron flux emanating from the test fuel. During power transients, this measurement provides time-dependency information that cannot be provided by the other two types of measurements described previously.…”

Section: B33 Hodoscope Determination Of the Pcfmentioning

confidence: 99%

Benchmark Specifications for TREAT Tests M5, M6, and M7

Tomchik

Wright

2023

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Section: B33 Hodoscope Determination Of the Pcfmentioning

confidence: 99%

Benchmark Specifications for TREAT Tests M5, M6, and M7

Tomchik

Wright

2023

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“…Four slots can be opened through the vertical concrete shield walls and permanent graphite reflector surrounding the above-grade core to provide various capabilities. Two slots are currently in use, one for a neutron radiography beam, and the other for a fuel motion monitoring system (commonly referred to as the hodoscope) capable of collecting spatially-resolved data for fast neutrons born in experiment specimens (De Volpi, et al, 1982 andChichester, et al, 2015).…”

Section: Transient Reactor Test (Treat) Facilitymentioning

confidence: 99%

Narrowing transient testing pulse widths to enhance LWR RIA experiment design in the TREAT facility

Bess

Woolstenhulme

Davis

et al. 2019

Annals of Nuclear Energy

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The Transient Reactor Test (TREAT) Facility provided thousands of transient irradiations and plays a crucial role in nuclear-heated safety research. The facility's flexible design and multi-mission nature saw historic experiments for numerous reactor fuels and transient types but was never specifically adapted to address very-brief pulse transients akin to postulated Light Water Reactor (LWR) Reactivity Initiated Accidents (RIA). Since the behaviors of fuel under these conditions depends strongly on energy input duration and resulting cladding time/temperature response under pellet cladding mechanical interactions, this three-year project was conceived to investigate new pulse-narrowing capabilities. Kinetic models showed incremental improvements for minor facility enhancements including increased reactivity step insertions (to initiate the power pulse) and slightly-increased transient rod drive speed for pulse termination ("clipping"). Replacing peak fuel assemblies, repositioning non-transient control rods to hold down the "hot side" of the core, and balancing against required excess reactivity needs, the limiting fuel assembly power can be reduced by ~20 %. This is a remarkable discovery of latent capability in TREAT, not only in enabling the subject capabilities for reduced pulse widths, but also significantly "uprating" the core's transient energy capacity. Incremental improvements can likely enhance TREAT's capability into BWR-relevant missions; briefer PWR pulse shapes can only be achieved with an advanced clipping system. Helium-3 ( 3 He) was found to offer the greatest benefits for clipping design and overall performance. A unique concept showed great promise for enabling a 3 He-based system with a reasonable cost; this design concept will likely become the focal point of future work.

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“…Slotted core configurations typically serve to provide a direct path from the experiment to the fast neutron hodoscope placed to the north side of TREAT as shown in Fig. 1 ( De Volpi, et al, 1982 andChichester, et al, 2015). The half-slotted arrangement requires less fuel removal from the core and results in greater available core excess reactivity than the full slotted arrangement, thus allowing for experiments and vehicles with greater negative worths to be tested, or higher power transient tests to be performed.…”

Section: Computational Modeling Of Treatmentioning

confidence: 99%

Nuclear characterization of a general-purpose instrumentation and materials testing location in TREAT

Bess

Woolstenhulme

Jensen

et al. 2019

Annals of Nuclear Energy

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The Transient Reactor Test facility (TREAT) was constructed in the late 1950s, provided thousands of transient irradiations before being placed in standby in 1994, and resumed operations in 2017 in order to reclaim its crucial role in nuclear-heated safety research. The latter half of TREAT's historic operation was best known for integral-scale testing of fuel specimens under postulated reactor plant accident conditions, while TREAT's earlier history included Use Specimen Transient Experiment Rig (BUSTER) test position of the MARCH system.Though results are directly applicable to MIMIC and BUSTER, they also provide general quantification of the nuclear performance of the reactor and potential test materials, crucial for evaluating potential experiment design and response in TREAT. The neutron and photon flux environments were calculated via MCNP with ENDF/B-VII.1 nuclear data. Wire heating rates and atomic displacement calculations were also performed; sample calculations using historic TREAT operational data were provided to demonstrate example conditions. These calculations were performed to provide steady-state baseline reference values typical in both half-and fullslotted TREAT core configurations, enabling design scoping analysis prior to development of more specific design testing needs and transient testing experimentation. Due to the limited availability of historic data to validate current calculations, validation experiments are planned once the BUSTER test vehicle has been constructed.

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Fast-Neutron Hodoscope at TREAT: Methods for Quantitative Determination of Fuel Dispersal

Cited by 27 publications

References 11 publications

Benchmark Specifications for TREAT Tests M5, M6, and M7

Benchmark Specifications for TREAT Tests M5, M6, and M7

Narrowing transient testing pulse widths to enhance LWR RIA experiment design in the TREAT facility

Nuclear characterization of a general-purpose instrumentation and materials testing location in TREAT

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