Computational Analysis of Downcomer Boiling Phenomena Using a Component Thermal Hydraulic Analysis Code CUPID

Author(s):  
H. K. Cho ◽  
B. J. Yun ◽  
I. K. Park ◽  
J. J. Jeong

A component scale thermal hydraulic analysis code, CUPID (Component Unstructured Program for Interfacial Dynamics), is being developed for the analyses of components of a nuclear reactor, such as reactor vessel, steam generator, containment, etc. It adopts three-dimensional, transient, two-phase and three-field model, and includes various physical models and correlations of the interfacial mass, momentum and energy transfer for the closure relations of the two-fluid model. In the present paper, the two-phase models were assessed against the DOBO (DOwncomer BOiling) experiment, which was constructed to simulate the downcomer boiling phenomenon. It may happen in the downcomer of a nuclear reactor vessel during the reflood phase of a postulated loss of coolant accident. The stored energy release from the reactor vessel to the liquid inside the downcomer causes the boiling on the wall, and it can reduce the hydraulic head of the accumulated water, which is the driving force of water reflooding to the core. This phenomenon has been considered as a crucial safety issue of an advanced power reactor because it is concerned with the core cooling capability of the safety injection system. In this paper, the physical models and correlations that were incorporated into the CUPID code were introduced and the validation results against the experiment were reported. The benchmark calculation results concluded that the CUPID code can appropriately predict the boiling phenomena under a low pressure and low flow rate condition with modification of the bubble size correlation.

Author(s):  
Hyoung Kyu Cho ◽  
Byong Jo Yun ◽  
Ik Kyu Park ◽  
Jae Jun Jeong

For the analysis of transient two-phase flows in nuclear reactor components such as a reactor vessel, a steam generator, and a containment, KAERI has developed a three-dimensional thermal hydraulic code, CUPID. It adopts a three-dimensional, transient, two-phase and three-field model and includes various physical models and correlations of the interfacial mass, momentum, and energy transfer for the closure. In the present paper, the CUPID code and its two-phase flow models were assessed against the downcomer boiling experiment, which was performed to simulate the downcomer boiling phenomena. They may happen in the downcomer of a nuclear reactor vessel during the reflood phase of a postulated loss of coolant accident. The stored energy release from the reactor vessel to the liquid inside the downcomer causes the boiling on the wall, and it can reduce the hydraulic head of the accumulated water, which is the driving force of water reflooding to the core. The computational analysis using the CUPID code showed that it can appropriately predict the multidimensional boiling phenomena under a low pressure and low flow rate condition with modification of the bubble size model.


1984 ◽  
Vol 106 (4) ◽  
pp. 477-485 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. M. Ghiaasiaan ◽  
I. Catton ◽  
R. B. Duffey

A quasi-steady, two-dimensional thermal hydraulic analysis of the two-phase region formed ahead of a quench front during reflooding of a slab or cylindrical core is carried out, and the results for slab geometry are compared with the experiment. It is shown that the two-phase level variation in the core is due to the transverse heat flux power profile, and is sensitive to the assumed pressure-drop boundary condition for the bundle, while the effects of crossflow and axial friction are small. Implicit expressions are given for predicting the quasi-steady two-phase level variation across slab and cylindrical cores.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 ◽  
pp. 1-8
Author(s):  
Shiyan Sun ◽  
Youjie Zhang ◽  
Yanhua Zheng

In pebble-bed high temperature gas-cooled reactor, gaps widely exist between graphite blocks and carbon bricks in the reactor core vessel. The bypass helium flowing through the gaps affects the flow distribution of the core and weakens the effective cooling of the core by helium, which in turn affects the temperature distribution and the safety features of the reactor. In this paper, the thermal hydraulic analysis models of HTR-10 with bypass flow channels simulated at different positions are designed based on the flow distribution scheme of the original core models and combined with the actual position of the core bypass flow. The results show that the bypass coolant flowing through the reflectors enhances the heat transfer of the nearby components efficiently. The temperature of the side reflectors and the carbon bricks is much lower with more side bypass coolant. The temperature distribution of the central region in the pebble bed is affected by the bypass flow positions slightly, while that of the peripheral area is affected significantly. The maximum temperature of the helium, the surface, and center of the fuel elements rises as the bypass flow ratio becomes larger, while the temperature difference between them almost keeps constant. When the flow ratio of each part keeps constant, the maximum temperature almost does not change with different bypass flow positions.


Author(s):  
Xiaoyu Cai ◽  
Suizheng Qiu ◽  
Guanghui Su ◽  
Changyou Zhao

The current Light Water Reactors both BWR and PWR have extensive nuclear reactor safety systems, which provide safe and economical operation of Nuclear Power Plants. During about forty years of operation history the safety systems of Nuclear Power Plants have been upgraded in an evolutionary manner. The cost of safety systems, including large containments, is really high due to a capital cost and a long construction period. These conditions together with a low efficiency of steam cycle for LWR create problems to build new power plants in the USA and in the Europe. An advanced Boiling Water Reactor concept with micro-fuel elements (MFE) and superheated steam promises a radical enhancement of safety and improvement of economy of Nuclear Power Plants. In this paper, a new type of nuclear reactor is presented that consists of a steel-walled tube filled with millions of TRISO-coated fuel particles (Micro-Fuel Elements, MFE) directly cooled by a light-water coolant-moderator. Water is used as coolant that flows from bottom to top through the tube, thereby fluidizing the particle bed, and the moderator water flows in the reverse direction out of the tube. The fuel consists of spheres of about 2.5 mm diameter of UO2 with several coatings of different carbonaceous materials. The external coating of steam cycle the particles is silicon carbide (SiC), manufactured with chemical vapor deposit (CVD) technology. Steady-State Thermal-Hydraulic Analysis aims at providing heat transport capability which can match with the heat generated by the core, so as to provide a set of thermal hydraulic parameters of the primary loop. So the temperature distribution and the pressure losses along the direction of flow are calculated for equilibrium core in this paper. The calculation not only includes the liquid region, but the two phase region and the superheated steam region. The temperature distribution includes both the temperature parameters of micro-fuel elements and the coolant. The results show that the maximum fuel temperature is much lower than the limitation and the flow distribution can meet the cooling requirement in the reactor core.


2016 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 22
Author(s):  
Filip Fejt

The paper deals with thermal-hydraulic analysis during reactivity insertion accident, i.e. a step increase of nuclear system reactivity by 0.7 eff, at VR-1 Reactor. The reactor utilizes IRT-4M type of fuel assemblies, and even though these fuel assemblies are designed for an operation at the high-power research reactors, they might be also used for zero-power reactors. The thermal-hydraulic analyses must take into account several specific assumptions that are derived from VR-1 reactor specifications. The reactor does not require a forced water flow for a fuel cooling, the core is placed in an open vessel with atmospheric pressure, and amount of coolant water in the vessel is sufficient for providing the inlet water at room temperature for the whole event. Coolant circulation is expected to be formed only by natural convection.


Author(s):  
A. Dragunov ◽  
W. Peiman

Pressure drop calculation and temperature profiles associated with fuel and sheath are important aspects of a nuclear reactor design. The main objective of this paper is to determine the pressure drop in a fuel channel of a SuperCritical Water-cooled Reactor (SCWR) and to calculate the temperature profile of the sheath and the fuel bundles. One-dimensional steady-state thermal-hydraulic analysis was conducted. In this study, the pressure drops due to friction, acceleration, local losses, and gravity were calculated at supercritical conditions.


2021 ◽  
Vol 327 ◽  
pp. 01013
Author(s):  
Svetlomir Mitkov ◽  
Ivan Spasov ◽  
Nikola Kolev

The objective of this paper is to analyze the ability of a VVER-1000 core and its control system to cope with a hypothetical main steam line break (MSLB) accident in case of multiple equipment failures. The study involves the use of advanced 3D core calculation models benchmarked and validated for reactivity accidents in preceding studies. A MSLB core boundary condition problem is solved on a coarse (nodal) mesh with the coupled COBAYA/CTF neutronic/thermal hydraulic codes. The core thermal-hydraulic boundary conditions are obtained from a preceding full-plant MSLB simulation. The assessment of the core safety parameters is supplemented by a fine-mesh (sub-channel) thermal-hydraulic analysis of the hottest assemblies with the CTF code using information from the 3D nodal COBAYA/CTF calculations. Thirteen variants of a pessimistic MSLB scenario are considered, each of them assuming a number of equipment failures aggravated by eight control rods stuck out of the core after scram at different locations in the overcooled sector. The results (within the limitations of the adopted modeling assumptions) show that the core safety parameters do not exceed the safety limits in the simulated aggravated reactivity accidents.


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