DATA BANK ON ACTIVATION CHARACTERISTICS OF RADIATION SHIELDING CONCRETE OF NUCLEAR PLANTS

Subject: studies conducted in the Russian Federation and abroad have shown that the induced activity and activation characteristics of radiation shielding concretes are determined by chemical elements, concentration of which in the initial components can vary within the limits from several parts-per-thousand to percentages by mass. In turn, activated shielding structures are one of the sources of non-deactivated radioactive waste at the stage of decommissioning of nuclear plants. To reduce activity and volume of radioactive waste, the selection of compositions of shielding concretes for nuclear plants should take into account the content of activation-hazardous elements. Research objectives: the purpose of this study was to justify the necessity and possibility of creating a data bank on activation characteristics of structural and shielding materials for nuclear plants. Materials and methods: computational and experimental studies included the studies of a wide range of compositions of shielding concretes, activity and volumes of activated radioactive waste. Results: the most important chemical elements that determine the long-term induced activity of shielding concretes were identified based on the data of computational and experimental studies. The structure, content and information components of the database on activation characteristics of shielding concretes of nuclear plants were developed. Conclusions: we have justified the practical possibility of targeted selection of the least activated shielding concretes of nuclear plants at the stage of their design and construction as well as the possibility of modeling compositions of operating and decommissioned plants when performing predictive calculations of the activity of materials and volumes of radioactive waste.