Calculation of the Neutronic Characteristics of a HTGR for the Verification of the MCU-HTR Software Package

AV Grol and VA Nevinitsa and PA Fomichenko and SE Sorokin and SG Filippov, PHYSICS OF ATOMIC NUCLEI, 86, 1827-1837 (2023).

DOI: 10.1134/S1063778823080203

Presented are the materials for the certification of the MCU-HTR software package, which implements the Monte Carlo method, as applied to the calculation of the neutronic characteristics of high-temperature gas-cooled reactors and critical assemblies with fuel based on microparticles with a multilayer coating. A verification matrix for certification of the MCU-HTR software package has been developed. All calculations were carried out using a special methodology that enables taking into account the double heterogeneity of fuel arrangement in the core and a detailed full-scale description of the geometry of the calculated objects. The volume of results obtained is unique in terms of completeness and content for the practice of calculating such systems. The calculated reaction rate distributions, efficiency of control rods, and neutronic functionals for start-up experiments of the HTTR reactor with prismatic fuel blocks, the pebble bed HTR-10 reactor, and the experimental configurations implemented on the VHTRC critical assembly are presented. Disagreement between the calculated values and experimental data for the listed characteristics is estimated.

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