MYRRHA, A NEW FAST SPECTRUM FACILITY

Since 1998, SCK-CEN, Mol, Belgium, in partnership with many European research laboratories is designing a multipurpose Accelerator Driven System for R&D applications MYRRHA. In parallel, an associated R&D support program is being conducted. MYRRHA aims to serve as a basis for the European experimental ADS providing protons and neutrons for various R&D applications. In its "Draft-2" version, MYRRHA consists of a LMAC proton accelerator delivering a 350 MeV*5 mA proton beam to a windowless liquid Pb-Bi spallation target that in turn couples to a Pb-Bi cooled, sub-critical fast core of 50 MW thermal power. In this paper we report briefly first on the status of the MYRRHA design, then on its current evolution towards the XTADS machine in the framework of the integrated project EUROTRANS and finally on the R&D related programme.