Thesis Abstracts 2005
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Homogeneous Slowpoke Reactor: Feasibility Study of Transforming the Slowpoke-2 Reactor for Homogeneous Fuel for the Production of Commercial Radio-Isotopes
By: Paul Busatta MSc Nuclear Engineering Candidate
Supervisor: Dr. H.W. Bonin
Abstract
The purpose of this research is to study the feasibility of replacing the actual heterogeneous fuel core of the present SLOWPOKE-2 nuclear reactor by a reservoir containing a homogeneous fuel for the production of Mo-99, a radioisotope widely used in nuclear medicine. The study looked at the following three aspects of the design problem: by using the MCNP 5 probabilistic nuclear reactor simulation code, develop a series of parameters required for a homogeneous fuel and evaluate the uranyl sulfate concentration of the aqueous solution fuel in order to keep an excess reactivity similar to that of the SLOWPOKE-2 reactor; verify that the homogeneous reactor will retain its inherent safety attributes; and, with the new dimensions and geometry of the fuel core, observe whether natural convection will still effectively cool the reactor using the modeling software FEMLAB®. The final reactor configuration as simulated with MCNP 5 was confirmed through simulation based on the deterministic core code WIMS-AECL. It was found that it is indeed feasible to modify the SLOWPOKE-2 reactor into a homogeneous reactor using a solution of uranyl sulfate and water.
