Verification of the ROSFOND/ABBN nuclear data based on the OECD/NEA benchmark on criticality safety of mox-fueled systems

Abstract

The paper presents the results of a computational analysis of the OECD/NEA benchmark conducted to estimate the accuracy of the critical safety parameters of multiplying MOX-fueled systems. The computational test is a set of 15 spherical multiplying systems that differ in their compositions and geometries. According to the test conditions, the keff values of the analyzed systems are unknown in advance. As part of the computational analysis of the test involving national codes and nuclear data libraries, along with the keff calculations, it is also necessary to estimate the a priori (due to the accuracy of the nuclear data used) and a posteriori (based on the accumulated experimental information) errors in the calculated keff values. Based on the benchmark, an updated version of the ROSFOND/ABBN-RF nuclear data was tested. The results of estimating the a priori and a posteriori errors in keff using the INDECS system for the proposed test models are presented. The analysis of the calculated data shows that (1) the observed spread in the keff values obtained from the Russian ROSFOND library and foreign evaluated nuclear data libraries (ENDF/B-VII.0, JEFF-3.2, JENDL-4.0) varies from –0.3 up to 0.8%; and (2) the deviation of the calculation results in the keff values obtained from the ROSFOND library and its group version, ABBN-RF, does not exceed 0.1%. The average a priori error in keff for all the tested options of multiplying systems is about 1% and, taking into account the selected set of experimental criticality data for MOX-fueled systems, including experiments at the BFS facilities, the average a posteriori error in keff can be reduced to 0.3%. The performed estimations confirm the high accuracy of the ROSFOND/ABBN-RF nuclear data for calculating the critical safety parameters of multiplying MOX-fueled systems.

Keywords

• MOX fuel
• integral experiments