Analysis of kinetic parameters of 3Â MW TRIGA Mark-II research reactor using the SRAC2006 code system

The aim of this study is to evaluate the kinetic parameters of 3 MW TRIGA Mark-II research reactor at AERE, Savar, Dhaka, Bangladesh from the viewpoint of reactor safety. The most important kinetic parameters of nuclear reactors are the effective delayed neutron fraction (βeff), the effective decay constant for ith family of delayed neutron precursor (λeff,i), the prompt neutron lifetime (lp) and the mean neutron generation time (Λ). These parameters are calculated using the 3-D diffusion code SRAC-CITATION of the comprehensive neutronics calculation code system SRAC2006 based on the evaluated nuclear data libraries JENDL-3.3 and ENDF/B-VII.0 in both cases. The calculated results of reactor kinetic parameters are compared to the available safety analysis report (SAR) values of 3 MW TRIGA Mark-II reactor by General Atomic as well as the MCNP5 values (numerically benchmark) based on the evaluated nuclear data library ENDL/B-VII.0. It was found that in most cases, the calculated results of kinetic parameters demonstrate a good agreement between the JENDL-3.3 and the ENDF/B-VII libraries as well as the SAR and the MCNP5 values respectively. Therefore, this study will be essential to improve the basic nuclear data of reactor kinetic parameters for safe operation of 3 MW TRIGA Mark-II research reactor.