Spallation in a nuclear energy system

There is a prospect that intense spallation neutron sources may become an efficient tool in alleviating some crucial problems troubling the fission reactor economy. However, the recent concept promotion seems to be based on fragmentary design and engineering considerations and inadequate system characterization. Premature claims may serve short term interests, but may also increase the chance that spallation research be eventually hit by public acceptance problems, if perceived as closely associated with the deployment of fission reactors. Therefore, a careful investigation of the actual benefits of associating fission reactors with intense spallation neutron sources is required. As an illustrative example for a static and dynamic impact assessment, the merits of intense spallation neutron sources as fissile fuel factories for fission converter reactors are investigated and numerical results are presented for typical design proposals. (orig.)