Benchmark Activities on Reactor Single- and Multi-Physics of the Working Party on Scientific Issues and Uncertainty Analysis of Reactor Systems (WPRS)

Ongoing Reactor Single- and Multi-Physics Benchmark Activities

Scope

The Working Party on Scientific Issues and Uncertainty Analysis of Reactor Systems (WPRS) and its Expert Groups co-ordinate benchmark activities on reactor single- and multi-physics. The benchmark activities serve the WPRS objectives:

to provide members with up-to-date information, preserve knowledge on, and develop consensus regarding reactor physics, thermal-hydraulics, radiation transport and dosimetry, and multi-physics aspects associated with nuclear power systems, aimed at providing the technical underpinnings of assessment of system performance and safety.
to provide advice to the nuclear community on the developments needed to meet the requirements (data and methods, validation experiments, scenario studies) for the assessment of different reactor systemsprovide training and educational material to the nuclear community, to assist with developing future technical expertise within member countries. Workshops will be held on WPRS benchmarks.
to provide training and educational material to the nuclear community, to assist with developing future technical expertise within member countries.

The activities address the the following reactor types:

Current fleet of light-water and heavy water reactors (LWRs/HWRs) as well as present generation of fuel designs.
Evolutionary and innovative LWRs/HWRs along with advanced and/or accident tolerant fuel designs.
Next generation of reactor systems including water cooled small modular reactors (SMRs), micro-reactors, high temperature gas cooled reactors (HTGR) as well as advanced fast spectrum systems including sodium fast reactors (SFRs) and molten salt reactor systems (MSRs).
Accelerator driven (sub-critical) and critical systems for waste transmutation as well as fusion systems.

Annual Benchmarks Workshop

The WPRS organises an annual WPRS Benchmarks Workshop (typically 1 week with 2 parallel tracks) in which the benchmark teams exchange on the status of their simulations and discuss benchmark specification updates.

Related topics

Nuclear Science Committee (NSC)

Working Party on Scientific Issues and Uncertainty Analysis of Reactor Systems (WPRS)

Expert Group on Reactor Systems Multi-Physics (EGMUP)

Expert Group on Physics of Reactor Systems (EGPRS)

Expert Group on Reactor Fuel Performance (EGRFP)

Expert Group on Reactor Core Thermal-Hydraulics and Mechanics (EGTHM)

Related events

May

2024

WPRS Benchmarks Workshops 2024

May

2023

WPRS Benchmarks Workshop 2023

May

2022

WPRS Benchmark Workshop 2022

ALL EVENTS

Overview of WPRS Benchmark Activities

The table below shows all ongoing and completed benchmarks under the WPRS guidance. Please follow the links to learn more about options to acccess the data and to participate in ongoing activities.

Benchmark Title	Reactor Type	Benchmark Type	Status
AI and Machine Learning Benchmarks by the EGMUP Task Force on AI and Machine Learning	Generic	AI & ML	Ongoing
Benchmark on Deterministic Transport Calculations without Spatial Homogenisation - A 2-D/3-D MOX Fuel Assembly Benchmark (C5G7)	PWR	Neutronics	Published:document, appendices
Benchmark on Pu Burner Fast Reactor	FR	Neutronics	Published via NEA DB
Benchmarks on Pu recyling	PWR; FR	Neutronics	Published via NEA DB
BFBT: NEA/NRC Benchmark based on NUPEC BWR Full-size Fine-mesh Bundle Tests (BFBT)	BWR	Thermalhydraulics; Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
Benchmark on Burst Fission Gas Release		Fuel Performance	Ongoing
BWR-TT: Boiling Water Reactor Turbine Trip	BWR	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
C5G7-TD: The Deterministic Time-Dependent Neutron Transport Benchmark C5G7-TD without Spatial Homogenisation	PWR	Neutronics; Multiphysics	Ongoing
CTH: McMaster CANDU TH	CANDU	Thermalhydraulics	Ongoing
FHR: Fluoride-salt-cooled High temperature Reactor	MSR	Neutronics	Ongoing
Forsmark 1&2 BWR Stability Benchmark	BWR	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
HTGR T/H Benchmark	HTGR	Thermalhydraulics	Proposal Stage
KALININ-3 Coolant Transient Benchmark	VVER	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics; Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics; Multiphysics	Published via NEA DB
LFR Benchmark: Lead-cooled Fast Reactor Benchmark	LMFR	Neutronics	Ongoing
LMFR T/H: Liquid Metal Fast Reactor Core Thermal-Hydraulics Benchmark (LMFR T/H)	LMFR	Thermalhydraulics	Ongoing
MHTGR-350: Benchmark of the Modular High-Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor-350 MW Core Design	HTGR	Neutronics	Completed
MOX/UO2 Transient: Pressurised Water Reactor MOX/UO2 Core Transient Benchmark	PWR	Neutronics	Published via NEA DB
MPCMIV: Multi-physics Pellet Cladding Mechanical Interaction Validation	Test reactor	Multiphysics	Ongoing
MSLB: Pressurised Water Reactor Main Steam-Line Break Benchmark	PWR	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
O2: Oskarshamn-2 (O2) BWR Stability Benchmark	BWR	Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics; Multiphysics	Ongoing
PBMR: Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics Transients Benchmark - The PBMR-400 Core Design	HTGR	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
PCMI: Pellet Cladding Mechanical Interaction Benchmark	PWR; BWR	Fuel Performance	Ongoing
PSBT: International Benchmark on Pressurised Water Reactor Sub-channel and Bundle Tests	PWR	Thermalhydraulics	Published via NEA DB
Ringhals-1&2 Stability Benchmark	BWR	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics	Published via NEA DB
ROSTOV-2: Benchmark on reactivity compensation of boron dilution by stepwise insertion of control rod cluster into the VVER-1000 core	VVER	Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics; Multiphysics	Ongoing
TVA Watts Bar Unit-1 Multi-Physics Benchmark	PWR	Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics; Multiphysics	Ongoing
UAM LWR: Benchmark for Uncertainty Analysis in Best-Estimate Modelling for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Light Water Reactors (LWR-UAM)	PWR; BWR; VVER	Neutronics; Multiphysics; Fuel Performance; Thermalhydraulics	Ongoing
UAM SFR - Subgroup on Uncertainty Analysis in Modelling (UAM) for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Sodium-cooled Fast Reactors (SFR-UAM)	LMFR	Fuel Performance; Multiphysics; Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics	Ongoing
V1000CT -VVER-1000 Coolant Transient benchmark	VVER	Coupled Neutronics/Thermal-hydraulics; Neutronics; Thermalhydraulics	Published via NEA DB

Working Area

Working area for benchmark participants: MyNEA (password protected)

Contact

WPRS Secretariat: Oliver Buss

Activities

results

Benchmark for Uncertainty Analysis in Best-Estimate Modelling (UAM) for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Light Water Reactors (LWRs) workshops

The Benchmark for Uncertainty Analysis in Best-Estimate Modelling (UAM) for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Light Water Reactors (LWRs) is an international high-visibility benchmark for uncertainty analysis in best-estimate coupled code calculations for design, operation, and safety analysis of LWRs. The annual workshops are attended by many experts in industry, research institutes, national laboratories, academia, and government agencies.

See

Deterministic Time-Dependent Neutron Transport Benchmark without Spatial Homogenisation (C5G7-TD)

To ensure reliable modelling of neutron physics within a state-of-the-art transient code, the neutron kinetics part of such a code should be based on the full-scale calculation of the space-time neutron kinetics equations without use of the diffusion approximation and spatial homogenisation.

See

Fluoride Salt-Cooled High-Temperature Reactor (FHR) Benchmark

Fluoride salt-cooled high-temperature reactors (FHRs), cooled with liquid (molten) salt, fueled with TRISO-based fuel are a potential molten salt reactor (MSR) design.

Lead-cooled Fast Reactor Benchmark (LFR)

Lead-cooled Fast Reactors (LFR) are rather new concepts which have gathered increasing international attention after the Generation-IV International Forum (GIF) selected them as promising candidates for a new generation of nuclear energy systems. The LRF physics benchmark is based on the Advanced LFR European Demonstrator (ALFRED) design and consists of a neutronics and thermal hydraulics stage with each three benchmark phases related to pin-cell, sub assembly/super-cell and whole-core simulations.

See

Liquid Metal Fast Reactor Core Thermal-Hydraulics Benchmark (LMFR T/H)

The Liquid Metal Fast Reactor (LFMR) is one of the next generation reactor designs. This benchmark consists of steady-state numerical predictions of Texas A&M University (TAMU) separate effect tests and of numerical predictions of the Thermal Hydraulic Out of Reactor Safety (THORS) integral effect tests and comparison to experimental results.

See

McMaster Core Thermal-Hydraulics Benchmark

Building on the NEA BFBT and PSBT benchmarks, McMaster University, in collaboration with North Carolina State University, launched a CANDU thermal-hydraulic benchmark under the WPRS Expert Group on Uncertainty Analysis in Modelling (EGUAM).

Multi-physics Pellet Cladding Mechanical Interaction Validation (MPCMIV) Benchmark

Rostov-2 VVER-1000 Benchmark

A number of tests with detail well documented neutronics and thermal-hydraulics measurements data have been performed at the Rostov Unit 2 (Rostov-2) nuclear power plant (NPP). The reactor type is a VVER-1000 with fuel assemblies of type TBC-2M, which enable an 18-month fuel cycle length.

See

Subgroup on Uncertainty Analysis in Modelling (UAM) for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Sodium-cooled Fast Reactors (SFR-UAM)

The Subgroup on Uncertainty Analysis in Modelling (UAM) for Design, Operation and Safety Analysis of Sodium-cooled Fast Reactors (SFR-UAM) was formed to check the use of best-estimate codes and data.

TVA Watts Bar Unit 1 Multi-Physics Benchmark

See