In core instrumentation for online nuclear heating measurements of material testing reactor

C. Reynard (1) , J. Andre (1) , J. Brun (1) , Michel Carette (1) , A. Janulyte (1) , O. Merroun (1) , Y. Zerega (1) , A. Lyoussi (2) , G. Bignan (2) , J-P. Chauvin (2) , D. Fourmentel (2) , W. Glayse (2) , C. Gonnier (2) , P. Guimbal (2) , D. Iracane (2) , J.-F. Villard (2)

1 LCP - Laboratoire Chimie Provence
2 CEA-DES (ex-DEN) - CEA-Direction des Energies (ex-Direction de l'Energie Nucléaire)

The present work focuses on nuclear heating. This work belongs to a new advanced research program called IN-CORE which means 'Instrumentation for Nuclear radiations and Calorimetry Online in REactor' between the LCP (University of Provence-CNRS) and the CEA (French Atomic Energy Commission) - Jules Horowitz Reactor (JHR) program. This program started in September 2009 and is dedicated to the conception and the design of an innovative mobile experimental device coupling several sensors and ray detectors for on line measurements of relevant physical parameters (photonic heating, neutronic flux ...) and for an accurate parametric mapping of experimental channels in the JHR Core. The work presented below is the first step of this program and concerns a brief state of the art related to measurement methods of nuclear heating phenomena in research reactor in general and MTR in particular. A special care is given to gamma heating measurements. A first part deals with numerical codes and models. The second one presents instrumentation divided into various kinds of sensor such as calorimeter measurements and gamma ionization chamber measurements. Their basic principles, characteristics such as metrological parameters, operating mode, disadvantages/advantages, ... are discussed.

Mots clés: neutron and gamma measurements; Gamma heating; Calorimetry; MTR; Material ageing

Domaines: Physique Nucléaire Expérimentale [nucl-ex]; Instrumentations et Détecteurs [physics.ins-det]

C. Reynard, J. Andre, J. Brun, Michel Carette, A. Janulyte, et al.. In core instrumentation for online nuclear heating measurements of material testing reactor. RRFM 2010: 14. international topical meeting on Research Reactor Fuel Management (RRFM), European Nuclear Society, Brussels (Belgium); National Center for Energy, Science and Nuclear Techniques, Rabat (Morocco); International Atomic Energy Agency, Division of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology, Research Reactor Group, Vienna (Austria), Mar 2010, Marrakech, Morocco. ⟨cea-01104087⟩