Conceptual study of axial offset fluctuations upon stepwise power changes in a thorium-plutonium core to improve load-following conditions
Journal article, 2014

The increased share of renewable energy, such as wind and solar power, will increase the demand for load-following power sources, and nuclear reactors could be one option. However, during rapid load-following events, traditional UOX cores could be restricted by the volatile oscillation of the power distribution. Therefore, a conceptual study on stability properties of Th-MOX PWR concerning axial offset power excursion during load-following events are investigated and discussed. The study is performed in SIMULATE-3 for a realistic PWR core (Ringhals-3) at the end of cycle, where the largest amplitude of the axial offset oscillations is expected. It is shown that the Th-MOX core possesses much better stability characteristics and shorter reactor dead time compared with a traditional UOX core, and the main reasons are the lower sensitivity to perturbations in the neutron spectrum, lower xenon poisoning and lower thermal neutron flux.

Thorium

Load following

Xenon oscillations

Axial offset

PWR

Stability

Author

Cheuk Wah Lau

Chalmers, Applied Physics, Nuclear Engineering

Victor Dykin

Chalmers, Applied Physics, Nuclear Engineering

Henrik Nylén

Chalmers, Applied Physics, Nuclear Engineering

Klara L Insulander Björk

Chalmers, Applied Physics, Nuclear Engineering

U. Sandberg

Ringhals AB

Annals of Nuclear Energy

0306-4549 (ISSN) 1873-2100 (eISSN)

Vol. 72 84-89

Subject Categories

Other Engineering and Technologies

DOI

10.1016/j.anucene.2014.04.038

More information

Latest update

3/27/2018