Thermal Cut-Off Energy for Accurate Analysis of Prismatic High-Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor

Abstract In this study, the appropriate thermal cut-off energy for neutron transport calculations in High-Temperature Gas-cooled Reactor (HTGR) is investigated. The research employs the Monte Carlo calculation code MVP3.0 to evaluate the impact of changing thermal cut-off energy on the multiplication factor in the single fuel element geometries, focusing on variations in fuel and moderator temperatures at both the Beginning Of Life (BOL) and End Of Life (EOL). Up-scattering effect mainly caused by graphite used in HTGR as moderator has strong relation to the thermal cut-off energy. The findings show that when the thermal cut-off energy is set at 20 eV, the multiplication factor tends to be underestimated, especially at high fuel temperature. Furthermore, the study confirms that when the thermal cut-off energy is at or above 30 eV the variations in multiplication factors remain within approximately ±50 pcm.