Sensitivity analysis of fuel rod parameters in steady state condition using TRANSURANUS code

Abstract

In this paper, a simulation of steady state conditions using TRANSURANUS code applied to Arkansas Nuclear One Unit 2 (PWR) fuel rod is presented. The fuel rod considered in this work was exposed to a peak rod average burnup of 64 GWd/TU, which corresponds to a batch-average exposure of about 53 GWd/TU. TRANSURANUS code offers two different approach for sensitivity analysis: Numerical Noise Analysis and Monte Carlo. In this work, sensitivity analysis using Monte Carlo approach was considered in the range of fuel rod manufacturing parameters, such as internal and external radius of the cladding, external radius of the fuel, and filling gas pressure of the fuel rod, in order to verify some existing correlation with fuel centerline temperature, internal cladding temperature, average tangential stress in the cladding, average permanent tangential strain in the cladding, internal pressure, and fission gas release.