TY - JOUR
T1 - Serpent transient analyses of GIACINT geometrical change experiments
AU - Talamo, Alberto
AU - Cao, Yan
AU - Gohar, Yousry
AU - Valtavirta, V.
AU - Leppänen, J.
AU - Sikorin, S.
AU - Mandzik, S.
AU - Polazau, S.
AU - Hryharovich, T.
N1 - Funding Information:
This work is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration, Office of Material Management and Minimization (M3). We gratefully acknowledge the computing resources provided on Bebop (https://www.lcrc.anl.gov/systems/resources/bebop/), a high-performance computing cluster operated by the Laboratory Computing Resource Center at Argonne National Laboratory.
Funding Information:
The submitted manuscript has been created by UChicago Argonne LLC, Operator of Argonne National Laboratory ("Argonne"). Argonne, a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science laboratory, is operated under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357. The U.S. Government retains for itself, and others acting on its behalf, a paid-up nonexclusive, irrevocable worldwide license in said article to reproduce, prepare derivative works, distribute copies to the public, and perform publicly and display publicly, by or on behalf of the Government.
Funding Information:
This work is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration, Office of Material Management and Minimization (M3).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021
PY - 2021/12/15
Y1 - 2021/12/15
N2 - This paper simulates seven transient experiments with geometrical movements performed at the GIACINT facility of Belarus. These experiments include three slow control rods insertion in more than 25 s, one fast control rod insertion in less than 1 s, and three water moderator draining transients. In the fast control rod insertion experiment, the control rods are first pushed by a mechanical spring and then let fall by gravity in the assembly. In this experiment, the control rods speed varies because of the initial spring force, the gravitational acceleration, and the water buoyancy force. In all other transient experiments, the geometry change occurs with a constant speed. The Serpent computer program was utilized to simulate these transient experiments with geometrical changes by performing two separate computations. One time-independent computation is performed in criticality mode and the other time-dependent computation is performed in dynamic-source mode. The first computation writes the neutron population and delayed neutron precursors for starting the transient simulation. The second computation divides the transient time into several time bins, reads the two files from the first computation, and updates them at the end of each time bin. The Serpent simulation results obtained for this set of experiments are in good agreement with the time dependent experimental measurements. In addition, Serpent and MCNP simulations results show an excellent agreement for the water moderator transient.
AB - This paper simulates seven transient experiments with geometrical movements performed at the GIACINT facility of Belarus. These experiments include three slow control rods insertion in more than 25 s, one fast control rod insertion in less than 1 s, and three water moderator draining transients. In the fast control rod insertion experiment, the control rods are first pushed by a mechanical spring and then let fall by gravity in the assembly. In this experiment, the control rods speed varies because of the initial spring force, the gravitational acceleration, and the water buoyancy force. In all other transient experiments, the geometry change occurs with a constant speed. The Serpent computer program was utilized to simulate these transient experiments with geometrical changes by performing two separate computations. One time-independent computation is performed in criticality mode and the other time-dependent computation is performed in dynamic-source mode. The first computation writes the neutron population and delayed neutron precursors for starting the transient simulation. The second computation divides the transient time into several time bins, reads the two files from the first computation, and updates them at the end of each time bin. The Serpent simulation results obtained for this set of experiments are in good agreement with the time dependent experimental measurements. In addition, Serpent and MCNP simulations results show an excellent agreement for the water moderator transient.
KW - Control rod insertion
KW - Giacint
KW - Serpent
KW - Transient
KW - Water draining
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85112533061&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.anucene.2021.108601
DO - 10.1016/j.anucene.2021.108601
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85112533061
VL - 164
JO - Annals of Nuclear Energy
JF - Annals of Nuclear Energy
SN - 0306-4549
M1 - 108601
ER -