RITAC: Reactivity Initiated Transient Analysis Code – An overview

Highlights: ► A point reactor kinetics code coupled with thermal hydraulics of plate type fuel is developed. ► The code is applicable to the extent of subcooled boiling of coolant. ► Safety analysis of IAEA benchmark reactor core is carried out. ► Results corroborate well with the results available in the literature. - Abstract: A point reactor kinetics code, coupled with thermal hydraulics of plate type fuel, is developed in order to carry out the reactivity initiated transient analysis of a reactor. Point kinetics equations are solved by matrix algebra, which involves piecewise constant approximation (PCA) i.e. the time dependent functions-reactivity and neutron source terms are assumed to be constant within an interval of time. This code is able to simulate various kinds of reactivity insertion like step, ramp, sinusoidal etc. for transient analysis. Effect of reactivity feedback is included into the code. Solution of kinetics equations gives neutronic power and it is then fed into a thermal hydraulic code where thermal energy conservation equations are solved by finite difference method along with Crank–Nicolson technique to find out the fuel, clad and coolant temperatures during transients. Results of the code corroborate well with the benchmark results.