Abstracts and Available Papers Presented at the
2005 International RERTR Meeting

NEUTRONIC PARAMETERS OF TAJOURA RESEARCH REACTOR FUELED WITH HEU and LEU

Omran Abuzid Abulgasem Faisel Abdula Abuatweirat
AbduAlhamed Kh. Ajaj
Renewable Energies and
Water Desalination Research Center
P. O. Box 30878
Tripoli Libya
e-mail omran_abuzid@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT

The computer code WIMSD5B is used to determine the cross sections of the reactor cells and then CITTATION diffusion computer code is used to investigate the neutronic parameters of the IRT-1 Tajoura research reactor fuelled with High Enriched Uranium (HEU) and Low Enriched Uranium (LEU). 4-tube and 3-tube of 80% enrichment, IRT-2M HEU fuel and 8-tube and 6-tube 19.7% enrichment, IRT-4M LEU fuel cells are studied. This paper presents the obtained results of the core with both fuel types. The fresh core calculations show that fuelling Tajoura reactor core with LEU will increase the fast neutron flux but decreases the thermal flux (detailed values are tabulated). The maximum values of the thermal neutron flux is increased almost three times using a central neutron trap The core excess reactivity increases by more than 1% when the core is loaded with 16 fuel assemblies all of 6-tube type and by more than 2% when the core is loaded with 10 fuel assemblies of 6-tube and 6 fuel assemblies of 8-tube type. The core excess reactivity for HEU is 14.02%,, for the 6-tubes LEU core it is 15.04%, and for the mixed 6 and 8-tubes core it is 16.21%.

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