A COMPARISON OF OXIDE DECAY HEAT SIMULATIONS AND NUCLEAR DATA LIBRARIES WITH FUSION IRRADIATION EXPERIMENTS

Abstract

We compare existing experimental decay heat data sets measured at the JAEA fusion neutron source (FNS), which employed a fast extraction rabbit system that in certain cases allowed the measurements to capture, at short cooling times, the decay profile of 16N in a range of oxides. Focussing on those data points and timescales that can be attributed to 16N, we compare measurements to simulations performed using the FISPACT-II inventory code together with evaluated nuclear data libraries. Making small corrections for other contributions at these short times, we derive integral cross section data estimates for 16O(n,p)16N from 12 oxide sample measurements and compare with previously obtained measurements in the IAEA EXFOR database and evaluations in the nuclear data libraries themselves.

Keywords

• decay heat
• oxide activation
• cross section