Burnup verification at Arkansas Nuclear One-unit 1 using the Fork measurement system

The Fork measurement system, designed at Los Alamos National Laboratory for the International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards program, has been used for several years to examine spent fuel assemblies at nuclear reactors around the world. The objective of the test program described here is to demonstrate the ability of the Fork system to verify the records for assembly burnup at U.S. nuclear utilities. The measurements described here were performed at Arkansas Nuclear One, operated by Energy Operations, Inc. The Fork system was used to examine 34 assemblies in the storage pool of Arkansas Nuclear One-Unit 1. The correlation between the neutron measurements and the reactor records produced an average random deviation in burnup of 3.0% from the calibration, which translates into an average variation of 2.2% in the reactor records for burnup. The system proved to be compatible with utility operations.