Preliminary study on the use of burnable neutron absorbers in the pressure tube type super critical water-cooled reactor

In a batch fueled reactor, it is necessary to compensate for excess reactivity in the wake of a refueling operation in order to maintain criticality. This paper presents a summary of a first attempt to remove part of said initial excess reactivity in the Pressure Tube type Supercritical Water-Cooled Reactor (PT-SCWR) concept. A set of small gadolinium-samarium burnable neutron absorbers were inserted into the ceramic insulator region of the PT-SCWR channel. The results show that the initial excess reactivity of the core has been nearly halved, and the initial Coolant Void Reactivity (CVR) has also been reduced substantially. (author)