Assessment of transient characteristics of fast reactors and influences of minor actinides using neutron transport method

Partitioning and transmutation of the minor actinides (MAs) from nuclear power plants are of importance for the nuclear-energy sustainable development. Fast reactors are applied to transmutation for the hard neutron spectrum and high neutron flux. However, the safety-related neutronic parameters will become worse when large amounts of MAs are loaded. In this paper, transients of a 600 MWe sodium-cooled fast reactor for MA transmutation are analyzed by using neutron transport simulation. The control rod withdrawal transients are calculated. Two cases are compared to investigate the influence of loading MAs into the fast reactor core. One is the common core loaded with mixed oxide (MOX) fuel, and the other one is the transmutation core loaded with MOX fuel and MAs. The results indicate that in order to apply similar operation criterion with the common core, the transmutation core with 6% weight fraction of MAs should be operated with more than 30% power reduction. In addition, the results of the transport-based transient analysis and the point kinetics transient analysis are compared. There are noticeable differences between them, which indicate that the usual way based on the point kinetics calculation is not suitable well for simulating the control rod introduced transients. Copyright © 2017 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.