Design, Development and Installation of Jordan Subcritical Assembly

Following its announcement in 2007 to pursue a nuclear power program and in the absence of any nuclear facility essential for the education, training, and research, Jordan decided to build a subcritical reactor as its first nuclear facility. Jordan Subcritical Assembly (JSA) is uranium fueled light water moderated and reflected subcritical reactor driven by a plutonium-beryllium source, and the core consists of 313 LEU fuel rods, loaded into a water-filled vessel in a square lattice of 19.11？mm pitch. The fuel rods are based on PWR fuel structural pattern type, made of uranium oxide (UO2) with 3.4？wt% 235U enrichment in zirconium alloy (Zr-4) cladding. Design, optimization, and verification were performed using MCNP5 nuclear code; the computed effective multiplication factor is 0.95923. The JSA is designed to fulfill the training needs of students and is equipped to perform all of the fundamental experiments required for a typical nuclear engineering university program. This paper presents the design, development, modeling, core analysis, and utilization of Jordan’s first nuclear facility and why this simplified low cost reactor presents an attractive choice to fulfill the preliminary experimental needs of nuclear engineering education in developing countries. 1. Introduction The design and construction of the Jordan Subcritical Assembly (JSA) is another step in Jordan’s efforts to develop its basic nuclear infrastructure and to introduce nuclear power as part of its energy mix. In 2007 Jordan announced its intention to pursue a nuclear power program [1], joining more than 60 newcomer countries that expressed their interest or declared their intention to develop a nuclear power program for the first time. Realizing the vital importance of human resource development, Jordan established a nuclear engineering education program at Jordan University of Science and Technology (JUST) [2], with the aim to have graduate qualified engineers that will help in the design, building, operation, and regulation of Jordan’s first nuclear power plant. In the absence of reactors or any other nuclear facility essential for the education, training, and experimental research of its nuclear engineering students, Jordan chose to build a small subcritical reactor as its first nuclear facility. Located in the Nuclear Engineering Department (NED) at JUST University, the subcritical reactor is the main experimental laboratory which offers students a hands-on experience in nuclear reactor engineering fundamentals [1, 3]. From the dawn of the nuclear age subcritical reactors were an