Assessment of homogeneous and heterogeneous resonance integral tables and their applications to the embedded self-shielding method

•Homogeneous and heterogeneous resonance integral tables are compared.•Limitations of the two resonance integral tables are discussed.•An additional parameter is needed to improve the heterogeneous RI table for ESSM.

Conventional resonance self-shielding methods are primarily based on equivalence theory, which allows the resonance integral (RI) table generated by homogeneous media to be useful for heterogeneous calculation. In the past two decades, a new RI table based directly on heterogeneous calculation has been developed and proved to be effective in the self-shielding calculation. This note compares the homogeneous and heterogeneous RI tables on the basis of derivation and numerical results. The limitations of the two RI tables and their applicability to the embedded self-shielding method (ESSM) are discussed.