Abstract
A very simplified model is used to simulate the equilibrium fuel cycle in a sodium-cooled fast reactor, considering (for the sake of comparison) two feed fuels: natural uranium and natural thorium, assuming recycling of all actinides under conditions of constant power density and constant fuel mass. The balance of reaction rates, equilibrium fuel composition, neutron balance, main safety parameters, as well as radiotoxicity and decay heat level of the equilibrium fuel are presented. The paper is a shortened version of the lecture given at FJOH’2013 summer school (Mikityuk, Equilibrium closed fuel cycle, 2013, [1]).
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Notes
- 1.
Doppler and void effects are evaluated as changes of the eigenvalue caused by the changes of fuel temperature from nominal to the melting point and of the coolant density from nominal to zero, respectively.
References
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Acknowledgments
The author would like to thank Dr. C. Fiorina and Dr. J. Krepel from PSI as well as M. Aufiero from POLIMI for multiple discussions of the subject.
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Mikityuk, K. (2016). Fast Reactor Physics. In: Revol, JP., Bourquin, M., Kadi, Y., Lillestol, E., de Mestral, JC., Samec, K. (eds) Thorium Energy for the World. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26542-1_33
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-26542-1_33
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