Monte Carlo simulations of differential die-away instrument for determination of fissile content in spent fuel assemblies

The differential die-away (DDA) technique has been simulated by using the MCNPX code to quantify its capability of measuring the fissile content in spent fuel assemblies. For 64 different spent fuel cases of various initial enrichment, burnup and cooling time, the count rate and signal to background ratios of the DDA system were obtained, where neutron backgrounds are mainly coming from the 244Cm of the spent fuel. To quantify the total fissile mass of spent fuel, a concept of the effective 239Pu mass was introduced by weighing the relative contribution to the signal of 235U and 241Pu compared to 239Pu and the calibration curves of DDA count rate vs. 239Pueff were obtained by using the MCNPX code. With a deuterium-tritium (DT) neutron generator of 109 n/s strength, signal to background ratios of sufficient magnitude are acquired for a DDA system with the spent fuel assembly in water.