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Validation Studies for High Burnup and Extended Enrichment Fuels in Burnup Credit Criticality Safety Analyses (NUREG/CR-7309, ORNL/TM-2023/3243)

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Publication Information

Manuscript Completed: November 2023
Date Published: April 2025

Prepared by:W. Metwally
M. Dupont
W. Marshall
A. Lang
V. Karriem
C. Celik
K. Fassino
A. Shaw

Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Oak Ridge, TN 37831-6170

Lucas Kyriazidis, NRC Project Manager

Prepared for:
Division of Systems Analysis
Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission
Washington, DC 20555-0001

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Abstract

Interest is growing in the use of extended enrichment (between 5 and 8 wt% 235U) and higher burnup fuels (up to 80 GWd/MTU) in nuclear reactors. Therefore, safe storage and transportation of the resulting spent nuclear fuel (SNF) must be demonstrated. This report investigates the effects of extended enrichment and high-burnup fuels on validation of burnup credit (BUC) criticality safety analyses of SNF storage systems. The report presents results from a detailed similarity assessment study conducted to determine the appropriate criticality benchmark experiments for different application cases. In addition, the report presents the calculation of the bias and bias uncertainty, nuclear data–induced uncertainties, sensitivities, and BUC loading curves for selected application cases.

Page Last Reviewed/Updated Tuesday, April 08, 2025