Once-Through Benchmarks with CYCLUS, a Modular, Open-Source Fuel Cycle Simulator

The CYCLUS project, based at the University of Wisconsin Madison, is an open source platform for exploring the longterm impact of alternative nuclear fuel cycles. The CYCLUS core provides the infrastructure for an agent-based approach, allowing user-provided modules to define the behavior of fuel cycle facilities as they interact to exchange materials. An important consequence of this approach is that innovative facility and material exchange concepts can be introduced to a consistent framework allowing for more rigorous comparison. The CYCLUS team has recently grown and now incorporates a variety of expertise: output visualization capability through collaboration with the University of Utah, server-client communication via the University of Idaho, input visualization and control with the University of Texas Austin, and social communication expertise through collaborators at UW-Madison to assist the mission-critical goal of relevancy vis-à-vis policy makers. Accordingly, the CYCLUS project is expanding efforts in the realms of both structural capability and benchmarking calculations. A series of once-through fuel cycle scenarios are being conducted using the CYCLUS core and accompanying modules. Where needed, additional modules have been added, including a region model that intelligently makes building decisions given a demand function. The results of these scenarios are then compared with VISION [1] to provide a benchmark of the CYCLUS results.