Neutronic Analysis and Fuel Cycle Parameters of Transuranic-UO2 Fueled Dual Cooled VVER-1000 Assembly

Abstract

The feasibility of transuranic (TRU) fuel rods has been studied for a dual-cooled VVER-1000 assembly along with the conventional UO2 fuel rods. It has been found that the heterogeneous arrangements of TRU and UO2 fuel rods help to improve the multiplication factor, enhance the fuel cycle parameters, and maintain the negative Doppler coefficient of the reference VVER-1000 assembly. Within the different heterogeneous combinations of TRU and UO2 fuel rods, the equal number of UO2 and TRU fuel rods, which is referred to as model 6 increased the multiplication factor of the reference assembly by 7.66% at the beginning of the cycle. Furthermore, the fuel cycle parameter becomes almost double for this model in comparison with the reference assembly. TRU rods make the neutron spectrum of reference assembly slightly harder and increase the fast fission rate. However, the Doppler coefficient becomes less negative, and flux level decreases with increasing the number of TRU rods. By considering the safety parameters and neutronic behavior, model 6 (equal number of UO2 and TRU fuel rods) is to be effective for the annular fueled VVER-1000 reactor.