Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418

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Progress in Nuclear Energy

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/pnucene

A feasibility study on low-enriched uranium fuel for nuclear thermal

rockets e I: Reactivity potential
Paolo F. Venneri, Yonghee Kim*
Department of Nuclear and Quantum Engineering, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), 291 Daehak-ro, Yuseong-gu,
Daejeon 305-701, Republic of Korea

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This paper is concerned with the possibility of implementing Low-Enriched Uranium (LEU) fuels in
Received 6 February 2015 NERVA (Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application) type Nuclear Thermal Rockets (NTR). It presents a
Received in revised form detailed study of the requirements for implementing LEU in a NERVA type NTR revolving around the
5 May 2015
softening of the neutron spectrum. This work has been done to demonstrate the possibility to enhance
Accepted 11 May 2015
Available online 29 May 2015
the proliferation resistance of these nuclear space systems in the hope of fostering the groundwork for
their eventual commercial use. The necessity of thermalizing the neutron spectrum is discussed along
with a detailed study of various methods by which this can be achieved. The effect of minimizing non
Keywords:
Nuclear Thermal Rocket
ssion neutron loss through the selection of appropriate structural materials is then presented along
NERVA with a cursory study of various options. Finally a reference conceptual reactor conguration is proposed
Carbide fuels and compared with previous NTR designs where its relative shortcomings and obvious advantages are
Low-enriched uranium (LEU) presented and discussed. It is concluded that an LEU-NTR is not only a denite possibility, but also offers
Hydrogen coolant distinct advantages over existing Highly-Enriched Uranium (HEU) NTR designs, particularly the increased
Proliferation resistance proliferation resistance of the system and the reduction of the fuel cost and development schedule.
Finally, some suggestions are made for future work that would enable the progression of the current
conceptual design to a more nalized reactor design.
2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction both requirements. While chemical rockets are known to be able to

For human spaceight beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO), the Nu-
clear Thermal Rocket (NTR) is considered as one of the most
promising propulsion technologies. This technology, however, after
demonstration in the 1960s and 1970s by the US NERVA/ROVER
program (Boussard and DeLauer, 1965; N Division, 1969), has been
largely dormant due to a series of reasons including a change in
government funding priorities, NASA mission goals, and public
opinion. Recently, NTR-related research has been rekindled due to
increasing interest in long-range spaceight including manned and
unmanned missions to Mars (Borowski et al., 2012).
The drive for NTR development stems from the need for a high
thrust and high specic impulse (Isp) propulsion system (Borowski
et al., 2012). It is generally perceived that the traditional propulsion
system of chemical rockets (solid and liquid) are unable to fulll
DOI of original article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pnucene.2015.04.013.
* Corresponding author. Tel.: 82 42 350 3831; fax: 82 42 350 3810.
E-mail address: yongheekim@kaist.ac.kr (Y. Kim).
produce massive amounts of thrust and are effective at getting
payloads off the Earth's surface and into orbit, they are severely
limited in terms of Isp (between 300 and 500 s). This results in a
non-negligible mass fraction of the initial mission mass being
dedicated solely to the propellant (Sutton and Biblarz, 2010),
making them an unattractive option for missions beyond LEO. On
the other end of the spectrum lies electric propulsion, which, while
being able to operate at an extremely high Isp, delivers a thrust that
would be measured in milli N rather than kN. This results in a
highly efcient system, yet one that would be unable to deliver a
payload in a timely fashion while still having a reasonable system
mass.
NTR systems, on the other hand, t into a unique niche in the
space propulsion performance space. Due to their ability to use the
lightest possible propellant (hydrogen) in combination with an
extremely high propellant temperature (~3000 K), they are able to
deliver relatively high thrust (hundreds of kN) while operating with
a high Isp (>900 s). The result is a propulsion system that is able to
deliver payloads to distant destinations in a timely fashion and do

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.pnucene.2015.05.003
0149-1970/ 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418
Fig. 1. Schematic of NERVA type nuclear rocket engine.
so with a minimum fraction of the total mission mass dedicated to
propellant. This compromise of performance parameters makes the
NTR the ideal candidate for missions inside of the solar system,
particularly in the case of a manned mission (Mars Architecture
Steering Group, 2009). A rendition of the NTR propulsion system
is shown in Fig. 1 (Durham, 1972a) showing how the reactor ts into
the larger propulsion system including the turbo pumps, external
shield, and nozzle.
Despite the clear performance and technical advantages of NTR
propulsion systems, they have thus far remained unimplemented
in long-range space missions, and what were previously successful
R&D programs have been relegated to low levels of funding and
eventual termination. One of the contributors to this was the large
quantities of weapons grade highly-enriched uranium (HEU) used
in the traditional NTR designs. Through the implementation of HEU
fuel, two things are guaranteed. First of all, the ownership and
running of any NTR research and development should be strictly
under the purview of the national government. This in turn pre-
vents the private sector from becoming involved in the technology
itself and prevents NTRs from becoming an economically self-
sustaining technology. Secondly, by utilizing HEU fuel, the pro-
pulsion system becomes a non-negligible proliferation risk in the
case of a mission abort or an accident in which the reactor should
return to the Earth's surface in a non-nuclear weapon country.
A clear solution to these issues is to replace HEU with low-
enriched uranium (LEU) fuel. It is clear that by implementing
LEU1 fuel, the above-mentioned concerns would no longer be
applicable to the technology, and would therefore signicantly
facilitate further development and eventual implementation. It
would also be of further benet by signicantly reducing the ma-
terial costs of the fuel as well as the development costs associated
with security, testing, and non-proliferation concerns, which would
then improve the development times of the nuclear system as a
whole. To date, however, there has been no effort to study the
technical feasibility of implementing LEU fuels in a NTR system
outside research connected with the authors.
The introduction of LEU as an alternative fuel to HEU in a NTR
brings a new set of design criteria and challenges that are unique to
a LEU-NTR system. Previously in HEU-NTR designs, almost the
entire uranium fuel was ssile material. In contrast, the LEU-NTR
has at most one in ve U atoms being ssile. This drastically
1
For the purpose of this study, low-enriched uranium is considered to be 20 w/o
235
U instead of the commercially available 19.75 w/o.
407
reduces the probability of ssion occurring in the fuel. In order to
increase the probability of a ssion reaction and improve the
neutron utilization within the core, two major changes have to be
addressed: softening of the neutron spectrum and minimizing non-
ssion parasitic neutron absorption. These methods and some
preliminary results have been previously presented by the authors
(Venneri and Kim, 2013a) (Venneri et al., 2013) (Venneri and Kim,
2013b).
The reference design and reactor studies of historical NTRs
presented in this paper are all based on the Small Nuclear Rocket
Engine (SNRE) developed by the NERVA team at Los Alamos Na-
tional Laboratory (Durham, 1972a, 1972b) and later revisited by Dr.
Bruce Schnitzler et al. at Idaho National Laboratory (Schnitzler and
Borowski, 2007). The neutronic calculations in this study were all
done using MCNP5 (X-3 Monte Carlo Codes, 1987) in combination
with the ENDF/B-VII cross section library (Chadwicket al, 2011). The
MCNP runs were done using 50,000 particles over 250 active cycles
preceded by 50 inactive cycles. This achieved a typical standard
deviation of .00022 for the neutron multiplication factor.
1.1. Rocket performance
In order to better understand the performance of the NTR, three
basic metrics are presented and explained. The three metrics are
thrust, thrust-to-mass ratio, and specic impulse (Isp). Thrust
(measured in Newtons) is a measure of the accelerating force
created by the propulsion system and is particularly useful to have
when large changes in velocity (DV) are required in a short time,
such as during ascent into planetary orbit. However, once the
spacecraft is in orbit, thrust becomes less relevant. This is because,
especially with a high Isp engine, acceleration can be sustained for
an extended period of time in order to achieve the same DV. The
thrust-to-weight ratio identies how much thrust can be effec-
tively applied to the space craft. If the thrust of an engine is high,
but its mass is equally high, then the majority of the force applied
will be used to move the engine itself rather than the rest of the
space ship and its payload.
Isp (measured in seconds) is a metric to measure the efciency of
a rocket or jet engine. It represents the force created by the engine
with respect to the amount of propellant used per unit time. The
importance of specic impulse is that it determines how much
propellant is required in order to reach a certain velocity (Sutton
and Biblarz, 2010). The relationship between thrust and Isp is
given in Eq. (1):
408 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418
F coolant as it passes through the reactor.
I sp
_ 0
mg
where F is thrust, m_ is the propellant mass ow rate, and g 0 is the
acceleration due to gravity. The Isp can also be dened in terms of
the ratio of specic heat at constant pressure to specic heat at
constant volume g, the propellant exit temperature T, the ratio
between the exit and chamber pressures pe and pc, the gas constant
R, the molar mass of the propellant M, and the acceleration due to
gravity g 0. This is given in Eq. (2) (Sutton and Biblarz, 2010):
s load bearing component, the inner and outer hydrogen serve as the
  g1
1 2g RT pe g
Isp $ 1
go g1 M pc
The relation in Eq. (2) is particularly useful in making an
adequate approximation for the Isp because the only variables it has
are the propellant exit temperature and g, which in turn can be
approximated by a linear relation to temperature at temperatures
above 500 K. The result is that by assuming operation in a perfect
vacuum, the Isp can be easily approximated using the results of the
basic thermal analysis done for the reactor core. Once the Isp is
calculated, the thrust can then be easily determined using Eq. (1).
2. The SNRE reactor model
The SNRE was the culmination of the almost 20-year NERVA
program (Durham, 1972a). It was the distillation of all the design
experience and material research that was done during the course
of the project to nally produce a wealth of design, material, and
experimental data. The SNRE can be subdivided into three sections:
the active core, the reector, and the forward section. The active
core is a cylinder that measures 89 cm in height and roughly 60 cm
in diameter. It is composed of 820 hexagonal elements, each of
which has a at to at distance of 1.905 cm. The core elements
come in two varieties: fuel elements and moderator elements (in
previous literature these were referred to as tie-tube elements). The
fuel elements are made of a (U,Zr)C-graphite composite with 19
coolant channels with a diameter of 2.56 mm. The (U,Zr)C com-
posite has a .64 g/cm3 uranium loading with a carbon content of
35% by volume. The fuel is described in detail in Taub (1973). Of
note are its excellent behavior at elevated temperatures (high
melting point and good thermal conductivity) and its high carbon
content that assists in moderating the neutron spectrum. The inside
of each coolant channel is then coated by a thin layer of ZrC in order
Fig. 2. Moderator element geometry.
to prevent the loss of fuel due to interaction with the hot hydrogen
(1)
The purpose of the moderator elements was to provide struc-
tural support for the core and anchor it to the core support plate,
provide a pathway to preheat some of the hydrogen coolant to run
the turbo pumps, and to create an epithermal spectrum in the core.
This is evident in the design of the element as shown in Fig. 2. The
elements are composed of seven nested components: the inner
hydrogen, the inner tie tube, the moderator sleeve, the outer
hydrogen, the outer tie tube, the thermal insulator, and the graphite
body of the elements. The tie tube components are the structural
hydrogen heating system and cooling of the moderator sleeve
(2)
which is the moderating component in the core. On the outside of
the element are the thermal insulator and graphite body to protect
the inner components and to interface with the surrounding
elements.
The reector region of the core is a beryllium metal reector
housing 12 rotating beryllium drums that are distributed radially
around the active core. Each drum has a 120 section of surface
covered by a thin hafnium plate which can be exposed to the
neutron ux from the active core in varying degrees by rotating the
drums. In doing so, the reactivity of the reactor can be varied and
thus controlled. The control drums are rotated by a system of ac-
tuators above the core, arranged such that they don't impede the
ow of hydrogen into the core.
The forward region of the reactor includes the reactor support
structure, control drum actuators, and hydrogen pump system. For
the purpose of neutronics calculation, these components are ho-
mogenized and considered as single blocks of the majority material
for each component. Immediately above the active core is the
reactor support plate, to which the active core is anchored by the tie
tubes, and is made of the aluminum alloy 2219-T87. Above it is the
internal shield made of borated lithium hydride to act as a neutron
shield between the active core and the components and the space
ship above the reactor. To the side of the forward region are the
control drum actuators, which, for the purpose of the neutronics
calculations, can be homogenized as blocks of aluminum 2219-T87.
The axial and radial geometry for the SNRE can be seen in detail in
Fig. 3. Here, the radial reector with radial control drums can be
clearly seen surrounding the active core consisting of the moder-
ator and fuel elements. The detailed geometry is given in Table 1.
Further details regarding the specics of the SNRE, including
detailed mechanical design of the components, are given in
Durham (1972a, b).
 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418
Fig. 3. SNRE radial and axial geometry.
3. Neutron spectrum softening
Due to the fast and epithermal spectra in traditional NTRs, any
reduction of the ssile content is difcult to compensate in the
current SNRE reactor. Table 2 shows the k-eff values of the SNRE
core for several U enrichments, and one can observe that the
reactor is extremely subcritical for a 20% U enrichment. In order to
implement LEU fuel, the neutron economy of the reactor core
should be signicantly improved. This can be achieved by
increasing the neutron ssion cross-section of the ssile material
(235U) and the minimization of non-ssion neutron loss comprised
of parasitic absorption and core leakage. Both of these can be
addressed through the softening of the neutron spectrum which
consequently has two major effects on the neutron population of
the active core:
1. First of all, the ssion rate in the fuel will increase. This is a result
of the ssion cross section increasing faster than the absorption
cross section as the neutron energy decreases. This will in turn
increase the reactivity of the core. This can be seen in Fig. 4
(Chadwicket al, 2011) where the ssion and capture cross-
sections for U-235 are presented, showing how while both
cross-sections increase in the thermal region, the ssion to
capture ratio is signicantly higher in the thermal region than in
the epithermal region.
2. Second is the reduction of the neutron mean free path both in
the fuel and in the reector region. This will in turn increase the
neutron non-leakage probability and further increase the reac-
tivity of the system.
Table 1
Detailed SNRE core geometry.
Parameter Value
Mass (kg) 1387
Number of Fuel Elements 564
Number of Moderator Elements 241
Active Core Radius (m) .295
Reector Thickness (m) .18
Active Core Length (m) .89
409
Fortunately, the mechanism by which the neutron spectrum can
be sufciently thermalized already exists in the traditional NERVA
NTR design: the moderator elements. With the system already in
place, it becomes a matter of repurposing it to increase the
moderating power in order to further soften the neutron spectrum.
In doing so, the primary purpose of the moderator elements is no
longer to provide structural support (yet remains an important role
for the elements) but rather to moderate the system. This repur-
posing happens in two ways. The rst is through choosing a high
performance moderator and maximizing the size of the moderator
sleeve in the moderator element. The second is by rearranging how
the moderator and fuel elements are distributed in the active core
to maximize the presence of the moderator elements in the core
without unduly sacricing fuel content. Once the spectrum has
been softened, however, the increase in parasitic neutron loss to the
structural material also has to be taken into account. This is done
through the selection and implementation of an appropriate
structural material.
3.1. Moderator selection
In this study, four different types of solid moderators were
considered: zirconium hydride (ZrH1.8), lithium hydride (LiH),
beryllium, and graphite. The reason only solid moderators were
chosen is to avoid redesigning the entire moderator element and
having to take into account axial density variations in the moder-
ator. Additionally, with the exception of water, solid moderators are
also the highest density moderators, making them the ideal choice
in terms of having limited space inside the active core region. In the
Table 2
Calculated k-effective comparison for the SNRE (std.
dev. ~ .00015).
Enrichment (w/o) keff
94 1.00005
70 .91846
40 .84606
20 .73162
10 .60678
410 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418

Fig. 4. Capture and ssion cross-section for U235.

selection of the moderator, there are a series of parameters that larger hexagon of moderator. The edges of the external hexagon are
must be considered. The most important of these is its moderating made to have reective boundary conditions, allowing it to simu-
power per unit volume followed by the moderator's ability to late an innite hexagonal lattice and determine the k-innity of the
survive at elevated temperatures and elevated hydrogen pressures arrangement. For each moderator, the size of the external hexagon
and its behavior in the elevated neutron ux expected in the active is varied such that the k-innity is found as a function of the ratio of
core. moderator pitch to the at-to-at (ftf) fuel size (pitch-to-ftf ratio in
The moderating power per unit volume of the moderator is Fig. 5). This provides a qualitative estimate as to how much of each
critical in the moderator selection. This can be easily calculated as moderator is needed in order to achieve a critical state and at what
has been done for the four different moderators in order for them to point the reactor will be over or under moderated. Two signicant
be adequately compared. The calculated average slowing down conclusions can be drawn from Fig. 5 and Table 3. First of all is that
decrement and the resulting slowing down power and moderating- ZrH and LiH are much better moderators than beryllium and
to-absorption ratio for the various moderators are shown in Table 3. graphite, especially when the volume of moderator is severely
These were calculated using thermal spectrum cross-sections at limited as it is in a NTR. Second is that there is an optimum amount
.0253 eV from the ENDF/B-VII.1 library (Chadwicket al, 2011). of ZrH and LiH that can be implemented beyond which the core will
Densities and compositions were found in the PNNL Compendium become over-moderated.
of Material Composition Data (McConn and et al., 2011). Following the moderating power comparison, each moderator
In Fig. 5, the effectiveness of the different moderators is must also be evaluated in relation to its ability to operate at
compared for the specic geometry in the proposed reactor. The elevated temperatures. Of the four, graphite has the highest oper-
study takes the basic fuel geometry using the (U,Zr)C fuel used in ating temperature, but is prone to non-negligible hydrogen corro-
the SNRE core design (Durham, 1972a), and then places it within a sion and is rather brittle. Beryllium, on the other hand, has the best
mechanical properties in addition to having a relatively higher
thermal conductivity than the other moderator types. The two
Table 3 hydrides have signicantly worse operating parameters. Both are
Moderating characteristics for various moderators. brittle, have signicantly lower melting temperatures, and in the
Moderator Slowing-down Slowing-down Slowing-down absence of a positive hydrogen pressure, are prone to dissociate at
decrement (x) power (xSs) ratio (xSs/Sa) temperatures well below their melting temperatures. Of the
ZrH1.8 .932 2.90 109.90 various ZrH structures, ZrH1.8 has the most favorable characteris-
LiHa .985 2.97 127.06 tics, making it the mechanically best performing of the hydride
Graphite .157 .060 220.39 options. In addition to having close to the maximum hydrogen
Beryllium .206 .156 137.89 content, it is also the structure with the highest fracture toughness
a
100% Li-7. (Libowitz, 1961).
 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418
Fig. 5. Comparison of moderator effectiveness.
Finally, in terms of behavior in an elevated neutron ux, two of
the selected moderators have signicant reactions that affect their
usability. First is beryllium. In an elevated and fast neutron ux,
beryllium undergoes a (n,2n) reaction, acting as a neutron multi-
plier. However, this positive reactivity insertion is countered by the
resulting production of He which can result in the loss of structural
integrity as it accumulates throughout the reactor lifetime. Lithium
hydride has a similar problem. Not only does the lithium have to be
close to one hundred percent enriched 7Li, there are also neutron
reactions with 7Li that result in the production of 6Li, tritium, and
helium. These lead to similar problems as the beryllium moderator
except that the negative reactivity insertion over time is much
stronger because of the high absorption cross section of the
resultant 6Li. The relationship between the 7Li enrichment and the
reactivity of the reactor is shown in Fig. 6. Here, the moderator
comparison shown in Fig. 5 is repeated for LiH using different en-
richments of 7Li, and clearly shows how even minimal amounts of
6
Li have a very serious negative effect on the ability of LiH to act as a
moderator.
Once the appropriate moderator has been selected, the
moderator density in the active core can be easily increased by
increasing the volume of the already built-in moderator compo-
nent. In the existing moderator element, the chief moderator
component takes up less than 10% of the total volume. The majority
of the element is occupied by the graphite hexagonal element.
While this component is necessary in order to act both as a thermal
insulator and as the interface between the moderator elements and
the fuel, it does not need to be as thick. The major thermal insulator
is the 50% theoretical density zirconium carbide between the outer
tie tube and the graphite layer, and the graphite is not a load
bearing component (Durham, 1972b). The combination results in
the moderator element requiring signicantly less graphite. There
is still, however, a limitation to how much graphite can be removed
from the element as it still has to be thick enough to be both
manufacturable and structurally sound on its own. There is, how-
ever, signicant room into which both the outer and inner radius
can be respectively decreased and increased in order to increase the
moderator volume fraction in the active core. The effect this has on
the core reactivity is shown in Fig. 7. The reactor conguration used
in this analysis is the standard SNRE core where rst the outer and
411
then inner radius of the moderator elements were respectively
increased and decreased to the maximum geometrical allowable
limit.
3.2. Moderator element geometry and arrangement
Another method by which the moderator density in the active
core can be increased is by changing the active core geometry such
that the ratio of moderator to fuel elements is increased. In existing
NTR designs, the ratio has typically been either 1 to 3 (SNRE)
(Durham, 1972a) or 1 to 2 (Pewee) (N Division, 1969) in order to
create an epithermal spectrum in the core. In order to achieve
criticality, the reactor design emphasized elevated fuel content over
moderation. However, as has been shown, the opposite is necessary
for a LEU NTR. Consequently, a variety of different moderator
element arrangements can be implemented in order to achieve the
optimal moderator-to-fuel ratio. A variety of congurations were
studied in detail and applied to a tungsten-fueled LEU-NTR at the
Center for Space Nuclear Research which were then applied to the
graphite core (Venneri et al., 2013). These congurations and the
resulting k-effectives are shown in Table 4 and Fig. 8 (Venneri et al.,
2013). These calculations were done for an arbitrary core in order to
compare the effect each conguration has on the k-effective.
It is important to note that in the case of the Inverse Beta
Stacking, the effect of having a reduced fuel loading outweighs the
additional moderation of the core. If the arbitrary core for the study
presented in Table 4 had been larger, the k-eff for the in Inverse Beta
Stacking would have been higher than the Inverse Alpha stacking
for both fuel types. The effect each different core arrangement has
on the core average neutron spectrum is shown in Fig. 9. Here it
becomes clear that with the increasing moderator to fuel ratio, the
population of thermal neutrons in the active core is signicantly
increased. This, in turn, has a direct effect on the reactivity of the
reactor.
3.3. Mitigation of structural parasitic neutron loss
In addition to thermalizing the neutron spectrum, the neutron
economy can be improved by preventing neutron loss that is not
directly associated with ssion and the production of other
412 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418

Fig. 6. Effect of Li7 concentration on reactor reactivity.

neutrons. Unfortunately, because of the required softening of the
neutron spectrum, the neutron absorption of most materials is also
enhanced. This can be mitigated by the appropriate selection of
materials that have low neutron absorption in the thermal energy
spectrum. The chief reactor component whose relatively high
neutron absorption cross section can affect the reactivity of the
reactor is the tie tube. The impact of replacing the tie tube material
in a thermalized SNRE core with a material having a lower neutron
absorption cross-section is shown in Fig. 10. Here, the SNRE core
was modeled with Zircaloy tie-tubes at different reector

Fig. 7. Effect of increasing moderator volume in the active core region.

 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418 413

Table 4 Among the candidate materials, three in particular stand out:

Active core element arrangements for LEU-NTR cores (std. dev. ~ .00025). enriched molybdenum alloys (TZM), zirconium alloys (Zircaloy 4 or
Arrangement M/F Carbide core K-EFF E635), and SiC composites. A comparison of various key parameters
Legacy (no tie tubes) All fuel .48993
is shown in Table 5. All four materials have lower neutron ab-
Beta stacking 1:3 .88615 sorption cross sections and are either inert or can be made inert in a
Alpha stacking 1:2 .96395 hydrogen atmosphere. Unfortunately, none of them has the same
Basilisk 1:1 1.06679 strength as Inconel-718. As a consequence of this, depending on
Bulls-eye 1:1 1.06768
which material is chosen, some changes to the mechanical struc-
Inverse alpha stacking 2:1 1.07248
Inverse beta stacking 3:1 1.02903 ture of the moderating elements may have to be implemented.
Regardless, each of the materials has some signicant advan-
tages and disadvantages. In the case of Inconel, as mentioned
earlier, it has the major advantage of high strength but relatively
thicknesses. In addition to illustrating the effect of having a low
high absorption cross-section. The molybdenum has the advantage
neutron absorption structural material, Fig. 10 also shows the effect
that it keeps its relatively high strength even at elevated temper-
of the reector on the reactivity of the core.
atures, is inert in a hydrogen environment without further pro-
Historically, the tie tubes in the NERVA type reactor have been
cessing, but requires isotope enrichment in order to reduce its
made of Inconel-718. This is a high strength nickel super alloy that
absorption cross section. With the enrichment of Mo-92, the
was designed and used for high temperature aerospace applica-
neutron absorption cross-section can be brought down to levels
tions. In the past, it was selected as the tie tube material mainly
similar to that of Zirconium. Without this enrichment, it has a
because of its ability to operate at elevated temperatures and ability
similar absorption cross sections as Inconel. Zirconium alloys have
to sustain the strain of being the primary structural component in
the major advantage of being largely transparent to neutrons, but
the reactor. It is also strong enough to withstand the strain of
the major disadvantages of being signicantly weaker than the
maintaining the fuel elements in compression despite the
other options as well as requiring signicant treatment in order to
mismatch in coefcients of thermal expansion. This mismatch re-
prevent embrittlement by the hydrogen. Finally, SiC composites
sults in even higher stress values which more than justify the need
have the benet of having the combination of having a relatively
for the strength of Inconel. Inconel, however, is composed largely of
high strength even at elevated temperatures along with a relatively
nickel, chromium, and iron (Hunt and Foote, 1977), all of which
low neutron absorption cross-section. It does, however, have the
have signicant thermal absorption cross-sections. As a conse-
signicant draw-back of being a brittle material, making it a po-
quence of this, with the enhanced softening of the neutron spec-
tential single point failure if it were put under too much stress.
trum in the core, it becomes necessary to study alternative
However, due to the importance of having to reduce parasitic
materials for the tie tubes which, in addition to having to be strong
neutron absorption, it is critical that a material such as a zirconium
structural materials, must also have relatively low neutron ab-
alloy or SiC (with an extremely low neutron absorption cross
sorption cross-sections.

Fig. 8. Different core lattice congurations.

414 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418

Fig. 9. Core average neutron spectrum for different core arrangements.

section) be used in any nal design. Both however have a serious
issue that needs to be resolved. For the SiC it is its brittle nature
while for the zirconium alloys it is their serious loss in structural
strength at elevated temperatures (Whitmarsh CL, 1962). Of the
two, the zirconium alloys have the most experience both in terms of
research and industry implementation. As such, a zirconium alloy is
currently seen as the preferred material, and is used as the tie-tube
material in the reference reactor core presented in this paper.
In order to use a zirconium alloy as the structural component in
the LEU-NTR, two criteria have to be kept in mind. First of all, is that

Fig. 10. Effect of tie tube material on SNRE reactivity.

 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418 415

Table 5
Tie tube material comparison.

Inconel 718 (Special Metals TZM Zircaloy-4 E635 (Shishov SiC composite
Corporation, 2007) (Mattas, 1994) (Whitmarsh CL, 1962) et al., 2013) (Snead et al., 2007)

Yield Strength (MPa) (~700 K) ~1200 ~630 241 ~520 ~240

Density (g/cm3) 8.2 10.16 6.56 ~6.56 3.21
Average Cross Section of Ni e 4.43 Mo e 2.65 Zr e .0111 Zr e .0111 Si e .176
Major Components (barns) Fe e 2.81
Cr e 3.1

the traditional zirconium alloys implemented in the US and Europe Table 6

are unable to operate at the required temperatures. As can be seen Final reactor conguration.

in Table 5, Zircaloy-4 is by far the weakest of the given materials, Parameter Value
and weakens further at higher temperatures. An alternative Mass (kg) 1179
example is the Russian zirconium alloy E635 which has a tensile Number of fuel elements 379
yield strength similar to that of TZM, and is signicantly lighter in Number of moderator elements 780
addition to having a lower overall neutron absorption cross- Active core radius (m) .35
Reector thickness (m) .065
section. This can be mitigated by rst, minimizing the stress on
Active core length (m) .75
the tie tube components. This could be done by increasing the k-eff e middle 1.00081 .00027
thickness of the tie tubes, ensuring that the inner tie tube is the k-eff e out 1.0186 .00024
chief load bearing component, and by increasing the number of k-eff in .98209 .00025
Radial power peaking 1.50
moderating elements in the core, thus distributing the load of
having to anchor the core to as many support elements as possible.
Second, it can be mitigated by keeping the temperature of the tie
tubes below the melting temperature of the alloy (this temperature Inverse Alpha core can be brought down in mass and still have
will vary from alloy to alloy). This is in order to avoid the cata- sufcient positive reactivity to function for the required operational
strophic reduction in the strength of the zirconium alloy due to period.
changes in the internal crystalline structure of the alloy (Hunt and The nal core conguration is summarized in Table 6 along with
Foote, 1977). The second criterion that needs be addressed is the the moderator element geometry in Table 7. The performance of the
potential hydrogen embrittlement of the Zircaloy during operation. core along with the peak temperature of the various components
This can be mitigated through the implementation of a hydrogen was then calculated using an early beta version of the Space Pro-
barrier on the surface of the tie-tubes. If these two criteria are pulsion Optimization Code (SPOC) being developed by the Center
successfully applied, zirconium alloys such as E635 should be for Space Nuclear Research (CSNR) (Husemeyer et al., 2015). The
successfully implemented as the support material in the LEU-NTR. results of the code have been qualitatively veried (in addition to a
For the current study, Zircaloy-4 was still implemented as the rigorous development methodology) by comparing them with the
structural material as it is neutronically almost identical to other experimental results of the NERVA PEWEE program (N Division,
zirconium alloys, and the material denition is well known to the 1969; Durham, 1972a). We found that the results produced by the
authors. beta version of SPOC follow the same axial and radial behavior
reasonably well. This can be seen in Fig. 11 where the axial tem-
peratures proles for the SNRE and the calculated temperature of
4. Reference LEU reactor conguration
the central fuel elements of the presented LEU-NTR are shown. It
must be noted that this version of the thermal code was designed to
With the knowledge gained from the various parameter studies
overestimate the temperature of the various components, giving
conducted, a nal baseline reactor conguration was established to
conservative results for the purpose of ensuring that they can be
demonstrate the implementation of LEU fuel. The proposed reactor
maintained within their operating limits. The resulting peak
baseline retains the same fuel element geometry and material
operating temperatures along with their failure threshold tem-
composition of the original SNRE design, but differs signicantly in
peratures are given in Table 8. Here it is shown that in the current
the design of the moderator element. Here, the thickness of the ZrH
conguration, the materials are either within, or at their operating
moderator sleeve was increased to the maximum geometrical limit.
limits. This demonstrates the feasibility of the design and indicates
Additionally, the thickness of the tie-tubes increased slightly from
that there is still room for further improvement of the baseline
the legacy tie-tube used in the SNRE design in order to counter the
design.
decreased strength of the zirconium alloy tie-tube material. The
In terms of operating performance, the presented Carbide LEU-
strength of the tie-tube material can be further strengthened by
NTR design is able to provide similar levels of performance to
implementing a high strength zirconium alloy such as E635. While
this will make a difference structurally, it should have little impact
on the neutronic characteristics of the design. The remainder of the Table 7
reactor baseline conguration continues to use the same materials Moderator element detailed geometry.
and dimensional relationships as the original SNRE design.
Component Material Inner radius (cm) Outer radius (cm)
The core conguration which was nally selected was the In-
Inner hydrogen Hydrogen .203
verse Alpha LEU core. The reason for this selection stems primarily
Inner tie tube Zircaloy .203 .254
from the study of the effect different core congurations have on Moderator ZrH1.8 .254 .684
the reactivity. It was shown that of the studied reactor congura- Outer hydrogen Hydrogen .684 .7605
tions, the Inverse Alpha conguration offered the potential of Outer tie tube Zircaloy .7605 .786
having the largest reactivity with the smallest core size. This then Insulator tube ZrC (50%TD) .786 .9
Hexagonal element body Graphite 1.905 cm at-to-at
lends credence to the belief that with further optimization, the
416 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418

Fig. 11. Comparison of the temperature proles of the central fuel elements calculated for the Carbide LEU-NTR using a beta version of SPOC (left) and the one provided in the SNRE
denition study (right) (Durham, 1972b).

previous and current HEU fueled NTR designs, except for in terms of Table 9
the Isp. In this instance, the current design operates at 775 s due its NTR comparison (Durham, 1972b; Mattas, 1994).
average exit coolant temperature being on the order of 1748 K. This Reactor Concept Pewee SNRE C-LEU-NTR
is because of the large radial power peaking factor of 1.5 preventing
Power [MW] 500 356 375
the majority of the core from approaching the maximum allowable
Isp [s] ~930 ~940 ~775
coolant exit temperature. If the temperature prole is adequately Thrust [kN] 111.2 72.95 110.89
attened either through radial power prole attening or oricing, Total system massa [kg] e 2545 2364
the specic impulse can be easily increased up to the desired 900 s T/W [N/N] e 2.92 4.8
Mass ow rate in the fuel elements [kg/s] 14 8.5 14.58
along with the consequent improvement in the system's other 235
U Mass [kg] 36.42 59.6 7.18
performance parameters. In doing so, the Carbide LEU-NTR will be # of Tie Tubes 134 241 774
able to meet the general operating requirements of the NASA Mars # of Fuel Elements 402 564 374
Mission Design Reference Architecture 5.0 (Mars Architecture Average fuel exit temperature [K] 2550 2695 1748
Steering Group, 2009). Consequently, the Carbide LEU-NTR can be a
Reactor plus shielding.
considered to be a viable option for such a mission. More surpris-
ingly however, and perhaps most importantly, the mass for the
LEU-NTR system, even when un-optimized, is similar to that of the Architecture Steering Group, 2009). This can be seen in Fig. 12
HEU-NTR systems. This means that in terms of operating perfor- where the longest burn time has been identied for the pre-
mance, the two systems are potentially quite comparable and can sented reference core at about 4 h, showing that it is able to operate
be used for the same missions without any signicant performance for the full required duration of a mission from Earth to Mars.
loss either way. This can all be seen in Table 9 where the perfor- Additionally, what Fig. 12 does not show is that the majority of the
mance values for the Pewee (N Division, 1969), SNRE (Durham, reactivity loss in the system is due to the build-up of ssion prod-
1972a), and the reference Carbide LEU-NTR are provided. Of note ucts in the core, and that provided sufcient time is left between
is that the Isp for Pewee and SNRE have been recalculated using Eq. full power burns, the reactor can operate for at full power for
(2) in order to make an adequate comparison between the Isp of the signicantly longer periods of time (Venneri and Kim, 2014).
various systems.
Yet most importantly, the core has been shown to be a viable 5. Conclusions and future work
design in that a critical core conguration is possible using LEU fuel.
Furthermore, the core is able to remain critical throughout the In this paper, the requirements for implementing LEU fuels in a
required mission operating time of 2e4 h of total operation (Mars NERVA type NTR have been thoroughly examined. It has been

Table 8
Reactor components limiting and peak operating temperatures in K.

Inner TTa Moderator Outer TTa Insulator Interface Fuel Coolant

Limiting temp ~1000 1088 ~1000 3800 4000 ~2800 None

Peak operating temperature 441 772 797 2717 2850 2850 2672
a
Tie Tube.
 P.F. Venneri, Y. Kim / Progress in Nuclear Energy 83 (2015) 406e418
Fig. 12. Reactivity change during reactor burn up.
shown that through the implementation of a thermalized neutron
spectrum in the active core, not only is it possible to design a viable
NERVA type NTR, but that such a core is able to have comparable
performance characteristics relative to the traditional fast spectrum
HEU cores.
It has been determined that the most effective method for
successfully implementing LEU fuel is to increase internal moder-
ation in combination with the implementation of materials with
low neutron absorption cross sections. In particular, it was shown
that the most efcient method by which the neutron spectrum can
be thermalized is to increase the moderator density inside of the
active core. This was done through a combination of increasing the
size of the internal moderator components as well as by varying the
active core geometry to increase the moderator to fuel element
ratio.
The signicance of this work is potentially far reaching because
it signals the beginning of an alternative methodology to past and
current NTR designs, which relied on the implementation of HEU
fuel. With this departure from HEU systems and opening the po-
tential of implementing LEU fuels, this study hopes to usher in a
period of research that looks towards the wider application of space
nuclear technology to non-governmental institutions and open its
development to commercial entities. With the conclusion of the
current study, future work will revolve around the development of
an optimized LEU-NTR core. Such a core will have to address a
series of difculties that are specic to the LEU-NTR including the
full-submersion criticality accident, structural integrity of the tie-
tubes, and reactivity transients involving the build-up of ssion
products.
Acknowledgments
The authors wish to thank Dr. Stephen Howe along with the
Center for Space Nuclear Research LEU-NTR team for all of their
help in the development of the LEU-NTR.
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