Conceptual design of UF4 powder richness and weight measurement system

One of the important steps in the nuclear fuel cycle is uranium enrichment. It is essential to carry out control processes using continuous measurement on the way to uranium with the desired enrichment of the facility. On the other hand, due to being in the environment with high external radiation and also suitable for internal exposure of the operator, especially when working with uranium powder, it is necessary to use accurate instruments with the ability to monitor online and continuously, which is a special place in the nuclear instrumentation. In this work, we decided to work on a conceptual design of the enrichment and weight measurement system for uranium tetrafluoride powder into loading and handling tanks in the nuclear industry. For this purpose, with the aim of reducing costs while eliminating maximum counting error, focus on reading only gamma rays emitted from powder or with radioactive lateral source was considered. The design was based on geometric location optimization of scintillating detector/detectors around the tank containing uranium tetrafluoride powder in order to have maximum accuracy in measurement. The simulation results in Monte Carlo software show that for different enrichment percentages and also different heights of uranium powder inside the cylindrical tank, we are able to have maximum accuracy in measuring two parameters of richness percentage and powder weight at specific angles.