Investigation of neutronic performance of a peaceful nuclear explosive reactor (PACER) evaluating UF4 and ThF4 nuclides

Abstract

In this study, neutronic behaviour of a peaceful nuclear explosion reactor (PACER) producing approx 1•2 GWe power from fusion explosions is analysed considering ThF 4 and UF 4 as fissile zones. UF 4 and ThF 4 are put in to the system adjacent to the inner-side of the flibe coolant zone positions (distance between explosive region and fuel zone, DR = 50, 100, 200, 400, 500 and 700 cm). Flibe percentages are taken to be 25, 50, 75 and 100%. It is found that optimum combinations of fissile zone thickness, coolant zone position and coolant percentages are 10 cm, 200 cm and 25% flibe for UF 4 and 10 cm, 50 cm and 25% flibe for ThF 4. The behaviour of fuels mentioned above has been observed over a period of 30 years at discrete time intervals, t = 30 days. In the case of UF 4 , M values at