A non-intrusive reduced order model for neutronic transient analyses of the ALFRED reactor

The safety analysis of Gen-IV lead-cooled fast reactors requires accurate evaluations for different operational and accidental conditions. The FRENETIC code, constituted by a full-core, multi-group nodal diffusion module coupled with a thermal-hydraulics one, allows to perform accurate transient calculations, but it is not suitable for the detailed parametric evaluations required by a thorough safety assessment. To fill this gap in the code performances, a non-intrusive reduced-order model reproducing an accurate approx- imation of the FRENETIC output with a reduced computational effort is proposed. The results obtained for a stand-alone neutronic transient involving the accidental insertion of a control rod show how the approach adopted is promising for computationally-efficient safety assessments.