An enhanced formalism for the inverse reactor kinetics problem

Abstract

Abstract The inverse kinetics problem in reactor physics is a standard formalism to unfold reactivity on the basis of registered power (flux) profile. The classical inverse point kinetics framework has been retrofitted herein to comprise thermal reactivity feedback effects. The instantaneous fuel and coolant temperatures are thus computed by way of the exponential time-differencing scheme and the corresponding thermal reactivity feedback is plugged into the inverse kinetics module. The core external reactivity is therefore unfolded employing only two consecutive time-steps of the power (flux) profile. A history independent yet straightforward numerical routine is accrued enjoying noticeable robustness with regards to the time-step resolution.