Reactor simulations with nuclear data uncertainties

The paper demonstrates the influence of uncertainties in microscopic nuclear data on the results of reactor simulations, both for stationary and transient states. It gives an overview on the methods in use for uncertainty and sensitivity analyses with respect to nuclear data, and discusses the pros and cons. For full-scale reactor simulations, in particular with coupled neutron transport and thermo-hydraulics, random sampling provides a powerful means to propagate nuclear data uncertainties through the complete calculation sequence. Results of uncertainty analyses performed with the GRS XSUSA - "cross section (XS) Uncertainty and Sensitivity Analysis" methodology are shown for radial power distributions from steady-state PWR calculations and for the time evolution of the reactor power in the course of a control rod withdrawal from a PWR mini-core. In all cases, the output uncertainties are considerable. For the radial power distributions, relative la uncertainties of up to 10% are observed, and for the power peak during the transient, the relative to uncertainty reaches 20%. These large uncertainties strongly suggest to routinely accompany best-estimate simulations by uncertainty analyses with respect to nuclear data, in particular for systems beyond LWR for which much less operation experience is available.