Evaluation of Pin-Cell Homogenization Techniques for PWR Pin-by-Pin Calculation

Abstract

In general, spatial homogenization, energy group condensation, and angular approximation are all included in the homogenization process. For the traditional pressurized water reactor (PWR) two-step calculation, the assembly homogenization with assembly discontinuity factors plus two-group (2G) neutron diffusion calculation have been proved to be a very efficient combination. However, this changes and becomes unsettled for the pin-by-pin calculation. Thus, this paper evaluates pin-cell homogenization techniques by comparison with the two-dimensional one-step whole-core transport calculation. For the homogenization, both the generalized equivalence theory (GET) and the superhomogenization (SPH) methods are studied. Considering the spectrum interference effect between different types of fuel pin cells, both 2G and 7-group (7G) structures are condensed from the 69-group WIMS-D4 library structure. For practical reactor core applications, the low-order angular approximations, including the diffusion and the SP₃ methods, are compared with each other to determine which one is accurate enough for the PWR pin-by-pin calculation. Numerical results have demonstrated that both the GET and the SPH methods work effectively in pin-cell homogenization. In consideration of the spectrum interference effect, the 7G structure is sufficient for the pin-by-pin calculation. Compared with the diffusion method, the SP₃ method can decrease the errors dramatically.

Keywords:

• Pin-cell homogenization
• energy group condensation
• angular approximation

Acknowledgments

This research was carried out under financial support by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 11305123). The first four authors would like to thank Y.-A. Chao for the helpful discussions.