Title: Pin power reconstruction: a new capability in the DRAGON5-PARCS neutronic system

Authors: Richard Chambon; Alain Hébert; Julien Taforeau

Addresses: Institut de Génie Nucléaire, P.O. Box 6079, Station "Centre-Ville", Montréal, Qc., H3C 3A7, Canada ' Institut de Génie Nucléaire, P.O. Box 6079, Station "Centre-Ville", Montréal, Qc., H3C 3A7, Canada ' Institut de Radioprotection et de Sûreté Nucléaire (IRSN), Fontenay-aux-Roses, 92262, France

Abstract: In order to better optimise the fuel energy efficiency and perform safety analyses in PWRs, the fuel power distribution has to be known as accurately as possible, ideally in each pin. However, this level of detail is lost when core calculations are performed with cross-sections homogenised over the fuel assembly. The pin power reconstruction (PPR) method can be used to get back this level of detail as accurately as possible in a small additional computing time frame compared to pin-by-pin full-core calculations. The DRAGON5 lattice code and the PARCS core code were recently interfaced. For this study, all the missing parts to be able to perform PPR were introduced in the newly developed system DRAGON5/PARCS. A major component was to set the methodology to compute the corner and assembly discontinuity factors in DRAGON5. Verification tests were performed on 12 configurations of 3x3 clusters where simulations in transport theory and in diffusion theory followed by pin-power reconstruction were compared.

Keywords: nuclear reactor physics; full-core simulations; DRAGON-PARCS interface; discontinuity factors.

DOI: 10.1504/IJNEST.2017.085763

International Journal of Nuclear Energy Science and Technology, 2017 Vol.11 No.2, pp.99 - 119

Received: 03 Aug 2016
Accepted: 09 Feb 2017

Published online: 12 Aug 2017 *

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