| 1. |
- Al-Adili, Ali, et al.
(författare)
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Fission Activities of the Nuclear Reactions Group in Uppsala
- 2015
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Ingår i: Scientific Workshop on Nuclear Fission Dynamics and the Emission of Prompt Neutrons and Gamma Rays, THEORY-3. - : Elsevier BV. ; , s. 145-149
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper highlights some of the main activities related to fission of the nuclear reactions group at Uppsala University. The group is involved for instance in fission yield experiments at the IGISOL facility, cross-section measurements at the NFS facility, as well as fission dynamics studies at the IRMM JRC-EC. Moreover, work is ongoing on the Total Monte Carlo (TMC) methodology and on including the GEF fission code into the TALYS nuclear reaction code. Selected results from these projects are discussed.
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| 2. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Benchmark selection methodology for reactor calculations and nuclear data uncertainty reduction
- 2015
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Ingår i: Annals of Nuclear Energy. - 0306-4549 .- 1873-2100.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Criticality, reactor physics and shielding benchmarks are expected to play important roles in GEN-IV design, safety analysis and in the validation of analytical tools used to design these reactors. For existing reactor technology, benchmarks are used for validating computer codes and for testing nuclear data libraries. Given the large number of benchmarks available, selecting these benchmarks for specic applications can be rather tedious and difficult. Until recently, the selection process has been based usually on expert judgement which is dependent on the expertise and the experience of the user and there by introducing a user bias into the process. This approach is also not suitable for the Total Monte Carlo methodology which lays strong emphasis on automation, reproducibility and quality assurance. In this paper a method for selecting these benchmarks for reactor calculation and for nuclear data uncertainty reduction based on the Total Monte Carlo (TMC) method is presented. For reactor code validation purposes, similarities between a real reactor application and one or several benchmarks are quantied using a similarity index while the Pearson correlation coecient is used to select benchmarks for nuclear data uncertainty reduction. Also, a correlation based sensitivity method is used to identify the sensitivity of benchmarks to particular nuclear reactions. Based on the benchmark selection methodology, two approaches are presented for reducing nuclear data uncertainty using integral benchmark experiments as an additional constraint in the TMC method: a binary accept/reject and a method of assigning file weights using the likelihood function. Finally, the methods are applied to a full lead-cooled fast reactor core and a set of criticality benchmarks. Signicant reductions in Pu-239 and Pb-208 nuclear data uncertainties were obtained after implementing the two methods with some benchmarks.
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| 3. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Combining Total Monte Carlo and Benchmarks for Nuclear Data Uncertainty Propagation on a Lead Fast Reactor's Safety Parameters
- 2014
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Ingår i: Nuclear Data Sheets. - : Elsevier BV. - 0090-3752 .- 1095-9904. ; 118, s. 542-544
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Analyses are carried out to assess the impact of nuclear data uncertainties on some reactor safety parameters for the European Lead Cooled Training Reactor (ELECTRA) using the Total Monte Carlo method. A large number of Pu-239 random ENDF-format libraries, generated using the TALYS based system were processed into ACE format with NJOY99.336 code and used as input into the Serpent Monte Carlo code to obtain distribution in reactor safety parameters. The distribution in keff obtained was compared with the latest major nuclear data libraries – JEFF-3.1.2, ENDF/B-VII.1 and JENDL-4.0. A method is proposed for the selection of benchmarks for specific applications using the Total Monte Carlo approach based on a correlation observed between the keff of a given system and the benchmark. Finally, an accept/reject criteria was investigated based on chi squared values obtained using the Pu-239 Jezebel criticality benchmark. It was observed that nuclear data uncertainties were reduced considerably from 748 to 443 pcm.
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| 4. |
- Alhassan, Erwin
(författare)
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Nuclear data uncertainty propagation for a lead-cooled fast reactor: Combining TMC with criticality benchmarks for improved accuracy
- 2014
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Licentiatavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- For the successful deployment of advanced nuclear systems and for optimization of current reactor designs, high quality and accurate nuclear data are required. Before nuclear data can be used in applications, they are first evaluated, benchmarked against integral experiments and then converted into formats usable for applications. The evaluation process in the past was usually done by using differential experimental data which was then complimented with nuclear model calculations. This trend is fast changing because of increase in computational power and tremendous improvements in nuclear reaction theories over the last decade. Since these model codes are not perfect, they are usually validated against a large set of experimental data. However, since these experiments are themselves not exact, the calculated quantities of model codes such as cross sections, angular distributions etc., contain uncertainties. A major source of uncertainty being the input parameters to these model codes. Since nuclear data are used in reactor transport codes asinput for simulations, the output of transport codes ultimately contain uncertainties due to these data. Quantifying these uncertainties is therefore important for reactor safety assessment and also for deciding where additional efforts could be taken to reduce further, these uncertainties.Until recently, these uncertainties were mostly propagated using the generalized perturbation theory. With the increase in computational power however, more exact methods based on Monte Carlo are now possible. In the Nuclear Research and Consultancy Group (NRG), Petten, the Netherlands, a new method called ’Total Monte carlo (TMC)’ has been developed for nuclear data evaluation and uncertainty propagation. An advantage of this approach is that, it eliminates the use of covariances and the assumption of linearity that is used in the perturbation approach.In this work, we have applied the TMC methodology for assessing the impact of nuclear data uncertainties on reactor macroscopic parameters of the European Lead Cooled Training Reactor (ELECTRA). ELECTRA has been proposed within the GEN-IV initiative within Sweden. As part of the work, the uncertainties of plutonium isotopes and americium within the fuel, uncertainties of the lead isotopes within the coolant and some structural materials of importance have been investigated at the beginning of life. For the actinides, large uncertainties were observed in the k-eff due to Pu-238, 239, 240 nuclear data while for the lead coolant, the uncertainty in the k-eff for all the lead isotopes except for Pb-204 were large with significant contribution coming from Pb-208. The dominant contributions to the uncertainty in the k-eff came from uncertainties in the resonance parameters for Pb-208.Also, before the final product of an evaluation is released, evaluated data are tested against a large set of integral benchmark experiments. Since these benchmarks differ in geometry, type, material composition and neutron spectrum, their selection for specific applications is normally tedious and not straight forward. As a further objective in this thesis, methodologies for benchmark selection based the TMC method have been developed. This method has also been applied for nuclear data uncertainty reduction using integral benchmarks. From the results obtained, it was observed that by including criticality benchmark experiment information using a binary accept/reject method, a 40% and 20% reduction in nuclear data uncertainty in the k-eff was achieved for Pu-239 and Pu-240 respectively for ELECTRA.
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| 5. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, 1984-
(författare)
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Nuclear data uncertainty quantification and data assimilation for a lead-cooled fast reactor : Using integral experiments for improved accuracy
- 2015
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- For the successful deployment of advanced nuclear systems and optimization of current reactor designs, high quality nuclear data are required. Before nuclear data can be used in applications they must first be evaluated, tested and validated against a set of integral experiments, and then converted into formats usable for applications. The evaluation process in the past was usually done by using differential experimental data which was then complemented with nuclear model calculations. This trend is fast changing due to the increase in computational power and tremendous improvements in nuclear reaction models over the last decade. Since these models have uncertain inputs, they are normally calibrated using experimental data. However, these experiments are themselves not exact. Therefore, the calculated quantities of model codes such as cross sections and angular distributions contain uncertainties. Since nuclear data are used in reactor transport codes as input for simulations, the output of transport codes contain uncertainties due to these data as well. Quantifying these uncertainties is important for setting safety margins; for providing confidence in the interpretation of results; and for deciding where additional efforts are needed to reduce these uncertainties. Also, regulatory bodies are now moving away from conservative evaluations to best estimate calculations that are accompanied by uncertainty evaluations.In this work, the Total Monte Carlo (TMC) method was applied to study the impact of nuclear data uncertainties from basic physics to macroscopic reactor parameters for the European Lead Cooled Training Reactor (ELECTRA). As part of the work, nuclear data uncertainties of actinides in the fuel, lead isotopes within the coolant, and some structural materials have been investigated. In the case of the lead coolant it was observed that the uncertainty in the keff and the coolant void worth (except in the case of 204Pb), were large, with the most significant contribution coming from 208Pb. New 208Pb and 206Pb random nuclear data libraries with realistic central values have been produced as part of this work. Also, a correlation based sensitivity method was used in this work, to determine parameter - cross section correlations for different isotopes and energy groups.Furthermore, an accept/reject method and a method of assigning file weights based on the likelihood function are proposed for uncertainty reduction using criticality benchmark experiments within the TMC method. It was observed from the study that a significant reduction in nuclear data uncertainty was obtained for some isotopes for ELECTRA after incorporating integral benchmark information. As a further objective of this thesis, a method for selecting benchmark for code validation for specific reactor applications was developed and applied to the ELECTRA reactor. Finally, a method for combining differential experiments and integral benchmark data for nuclear data adjustments is proposed and applied for the adjustment of neutron induced 208Pb nuclear data in the fast energy region.
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| 6. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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On the use of integral experiments for uncertainty reduction of reactor macroscopic parameters within the TMC methodology
- 2016
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Ingår i: Progress in nuclear energy (New series). - : Elsevier BV. - 0149-1970 .- 1878-4224. ; 88, s. 43-52
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The current nuclear data uncertainties observed in reactor safety parameters for some nuclides call for safety concerns especially with respect to the design of GEN-IV reactors and must therefore be reduced significantly. In this work, uncertainty reduction using criticality benchmark experiments within the Total Monte Carlo methodology is presented. Random nuclear data libraries generated are processed and used to analyze a set of criticality benchmarks. Since the calculated results for each random nuclear data used are different, an algorithm was used to select (or assign weights to) the libraries which give a good description of experimental data for the analyses of the benchmarks. The selected or weighted libraries were then used to analyze the ELECTRA reactor. By using random nuclear data libraries constrained with only differential experimental data as our prior, the uncertainties observed were further reduced by constraining the files with integral experimental data to obtain a posteriori uncertainties on the k(eff). Two approaches are presented and compared: a binary accept/reject and a method of assigning file weights based on the likelihood function. Significant reductions in (PU)-P-239 and Pb-208 nuclear data uncertainties in the k(eff) were observed after implementing the two methods with some criticality benchmarks for the ELELIRA reactor. (C) 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
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| 7. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Reducing A Priori 239Pu Nuclear Data Uncertainty In The Keff Using A Set Of Criticality Benchmarks With Different Nuclear Data Libraries
- 2015
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In the Total Monte Carlo (TMC) method [1] developed at the Nuclear Research and Consultancy Group for nuclear data uncertainty propagation, model calculations are compared with differential experimental data and a specific a priori uncertainty is assigned to each model parameter. By varying the model parameters all together within model parameter uncertainties, a full covariance matrix is obtained with its off diagonal elements if desired [1]. In this way, differential experimental data serve as a constraint for the model parameters used in the TALYS nuclear reactions code for the production of random nuclear data files. These files are processed into usable formats and used in transport codes for reactor calculations and for uncertainty propagation to reactor macroscopic parameters of interest. Even though differential experimental data together with their uncertainties are included (implicitly) in the production of these random nuclear data files in the TMC method, wide spreads in parameter distributions have been observed, leading to large uncertainties in reactor parameters for some nuclides for the European Lead cooled Training Reactor [2]. Due to safety concerns and the development of GEN-IV reactors with their challenging technological goals, the present uncertainties should be reduced significantly if the benefits from advances in modelling and simulations are to be utilized fully [3]. In Ref.[4], a binary accept/reject approach and a more rigorous method of assigning file weights based on the likelihood function were proposed and presented for reducing nuclear data uncertainties using a set of integral benchmarks obtained from the International Handbook of Evaluated Criticality Safety Benchmark Experiments (ICSBEP). These methods are depended on the reference nuclear data library used, the combined benchmark uncertainty and the relevance of each benchmark for reducing nuclear data uncertainties for a particular reactor system. Since each nuclear data library normally comes with its own nominal values and covariance matrices, reactor calculations and uncertainties computed with these libraries differ from library to library. In this work, we apply the binary accept/reject approach and the method of assigning file weights based on the likelihood function for reducing a priori 239Pu nuclear data uncertainties for the European Lead Cooled Training Reactor (ELECTRA) using a set of criticality benchmarks. Prior and posterior uncertainties computed for ELECTRA using ENDF/B-VII.1, JEFF-3.2 and JENDL-4.0 are compared after including experimental information from over 10 benchmarks.[1] A.J. Koning and D. Rochman, Modern Nuclear Data Evaluation with the TALYS Code System. Nuclear Data Sheets 113 (2012) 2841-2934. [2] E. Alhassan, H. Sjöstrand, P. Helgesson, A. J. Koning, M. Österlund, S. Pomp, D. Rochman, Uncertainty and correlation analysis of lead nuclear data on reactor parameters for the European Lead Cooled Training reactor (ELECTRA). Annals of Nuclear Energy 75 (2015) 26-37. [3] G. Palmiotti, M. Salvatores, G. Aliberti, H. Hiruta, R. McKnight, P. Oblozinsky, W. Yang, A global approach to the physics validation of simulation codes for future nuclear systems, Annals of Nuclear Energy 36 (3) (2009) 355-361. [4] E. Alhassan, H. Sjöstrand, J. Duan, P. Helgesson, S. Pomp, M. Österlund, D. Rochman, A.J. Koning, Selecting benchmarks for reactor calculations: In proc. PHYSOR 2014 - The Role of Reactor Physics toward a Sustainable Future, kyoto, Japan, Sep. 28 - 3 Oct. (2014).
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| 8. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Selecting benchmarks for reactor calculations
- 2014
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Ingår i: PHYSOR 2014 - The Role of Reactor Physics toward a Sustainable Future.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Criticality, reactor physics, fusion and shielding benchmarks are expected to play important roles in GENIV design, safety analysis and in the validation of analytical tools used to design these reactors. For existing reactor technology, benchmarks are used to validate computer codes and test nuclear data libraries. However the selection of these benchmarks are usually done by visual inspection which is dependent on the expertise and the experience of the user and there by resulting in a user bias in the process. In this paper we present a method for the selection of these benchmarks for reactor applications based on Total Monte Carlo (TMC). Similarities betweenan application case and one or several benchmarks are quantified using the correlation coefficient. Based on the method, we also propose an approach for reducing nuclear data uncertainty using integral benchmark experiments as an additional constrain on nuclear reaction models: a binary accept/reject criterion. Finally, the method was applied to a full Lead Fast Reactor core and a set of criticality benchmarks.
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| 9. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Selecting benchmarks for reactor simulations : an application to a Lead Fast Reactor
- 2016
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Ingår i: Annals of Nuclear Energy. - : Elsevier BV. - 0306-4549 .- 1873-2100. ; 96, s. 158-169
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- For several decades reactor design has been supported by computer codes for the investigation of reactor behavior under both steady state and transient conditions. The use of computer codes to simulate reactor behavior enables the investigation of various safety scenarios saving time and cost. There has been an increase in the development of in-house (local) codes by various research groups in recent times for preliminary design of specific or targeted nuclear reactor applications. These codes must be validated and calibrated against experimental benchmark data with their evolution and improvements. Given the large number of benchmarks available, selecting these benchmarks for reactor calculations and validation of simulation codes for specific or target applications can be rather tedious and difficult. In the past, the traditional approach based on expert judgement using information provided in various handbooks, has been used for the selection of these benchmarks. This approach has been criticized because it introduces a user bias into the selection process. This paper presents a method for selecting these benchmarks for reactor calculations for specific reactor applications based on the Total Monte Carlo (TMC) method. First, nuclear model parameters are randomly sampled within a given probability distribution and a large set of random nuclear data files are produced using the TALYS code system. These files are processed and used to analyze a target reactor system and a set of criticality benchmarks. Similarity between the target reactor system and one or several benchmarks is quantified using a similarity index. The method has been applied to the European Lead Cooled Reactor (ELECTRA) and a set of plutonium and lead sensitive criticality benchmarks using the effective multiplication factor (keffkeff). From the study, strong similarity were observed in the keffkeff between ELECTRA and some plutonium and lead sensitive criticality benchmarks. Also, for validation purposes, simulation results for a list of selected criticality benchmarks simulated with the MCNPX and SERPENT codes using different nuclear data libraries have been compared with experimentally measured benchmark keff values.
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| 10. |
- Alhassan, Erwin, et al.
(författare)
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Uncertainty analysis of Lead cross sections on reactor safety for ELECTRA
- 2016
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Ingår i: SNA + MC 2013 - Joint International Conference on Supercomputing in Nuclear Applications + Monte Carlo. - Les Ulis, France : EDP Sciences.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Total Monte Carlo (TMC) method was used in this study to assess the impact of Pb-206, 207 and 208 nucleardata uncertainties on k-eff , beta-eff, coolant temperature coefficient, the coolant void worth for the ELECTRA reactor. Relatively large uncertainties were observed in the k-eff and the coolant void worth for all the isotopes with significant contribution coming from Pb-208 nuclear data. The large Pb-208 nuclear data uncertainty observed was further investigated by studying the impact of partial channels on the k-eff and beta-eff. Various sections of ENDF file: elasticscattering (n,el), inelastic scattering (n,inl), neutron capture (n,gamma), (n,2n), resonance parameters and the angular distribution were varied randomly and distributions in k-eff and beta-eff obtained. The dominant contributions to the uncertainty in the k-eff from Pb-208 came from uncertainties in the resonance parameters; however, elastic scattering cross section and the angular distribution also had significant impact. The impact of nuclear data uncertainties on the beta-eff was observed to be small.
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