Improved Prediction of the Temperature Feedback in TRISO-Fueled Reactors

The Doppler feedback mechanism is a major contributor to the passive safety of gas-cooled, graphite-moderated high temperature reactors that use fuel based on Tristructural-Isotropic coated particles. It follows that the correct prediction of the magnitude and time-dependence of this feedback effect is essential to the conduct of safety analyses for these reactors. We present a fuel conduction model for obtaining better estimates of the temperature feedback during moderate and fast transients. The fuel model has been incorporated in the CYNOD-THERMIX-KONVEK suite of coupled codes as a single TRISO particle within each calculation cell. The heat generation rate is scaled down from the neutronic solution and a Dirichlet boundary condition is imposed as the bulk graphite temperature from the thermal-hydraulic solution. This simplified approach yields similar results to those obtained with more complex methods, requiring multi-TRISO calculations within one control volume, but with much less computational effort. An analysis of the hypothetical total control ejection in the PBMR-400 design verifies the performance of the code during fast transients. In addition, the analysis of the earthquake-initiated event in the PBMR-400 design verifies the performance of the code during slow transients. These events clearly depict the improvement in the predictions of the fuel temperature, and consequently, of the power escalations. In addition, a brief study of the potential effects of particle layer de-bonding on the transient behavior of high temperature reactors is included. Although the formation of a gap occurs under special conditions its consequences on the dynamic behavior of the reactor should be analyzed. The presence of a gap in the fuel can cause some unusual reactor behavior during fast transients, but still the reactor shuts down due to the strong feedback effects

A One-group, One-dimensional Transport Benchmark in Cylindrical Geometry

A 1-D, 1-group computational benchmark in cylndrical geometry is described. This neutron transport benchmark is useful for evaluating reactor concepts that possess azimuthal symmetry such as a pebble-bed reactor

The Boundary Element Formulation of the 1-Group, 1-D Nodal Equations

A boundary element method is developed for the 1-D nodal diffusion equation in cylindrical geometry. This method retains the matrix qualities of the nodal formulation while providing an accurate computational benchmark for evaluating reactor analysis codes

Pebble Bed Reactor Dust Production Model

The operation of pebble bed reactors, including fuel circulation, can generate graphite dust, which in turn could be a concern for internal components; and to the near field in the remote event of a break in the coolant circuits. The design of the reactor system must, therefore, take the dust into account and the operation must include contingencies for dust removal and for mitigation of potential releases. Such planning requires a proper assessment of the dust inventory. This paper presents a predictive model of dust generation in an operating pebble bed with recirculating fuel. In this preliminary work the production model is based on the use of the assumption of proportionality between the dust production and the normal force and distance traveled. The model developed in this work uses the slip distances and the inter-pebble forces computed by the authors’ PEBBLES. The code, based on the discrete element method, simulates the relevant static and kinetic friction interactions between the pebbles as well as the recirculation of the pebbles through the reactor vessel. The interaction between pebbles and walls of the reactor vat is treated using the same approach. The amount of dust produced is proportional to the wear coefficient for adhesive wear (taken from literature) and to the slip volume, the product of the contact area and the slip distance. The paper will compare the predicted volume with the measured production rates. The simulation tallies the dust production based on the location of creation. Two peak production zones from intra pebble forces are predicted within the bed. The first zone is located near the pebble inlet chute due to the speed of the dropping pebbles. The second peak zone occurs lower in the reactor with increased pebble contact force due to the weight of supported pebbles. This paper presents the first use of a Discrete Element Method simulation of pebble bed dust production

Computation of Dancoff Factors for Fuel Elements Incorporating Randomly Packed TRISO Particles

A new method for estimating the Dancoff factors in pebble beds has been developed and implemented within two computer codes. The first of these codes, INTRAPEB, is used to compute Dancoff factors for individual pebbles taking into account the random packing of TRISO particles within the fuel zone of the pebble and explicitly accounting for the finite geometry of the fuel kernels. The second code, PEBDAN, is used to compute the pebble-to-pebble contribution to the overall Dancoff factor. The latter code also accounts for the finite size of the reactor vessel and for the proximity of reflectors, as well as for fluctuations in the pebble packing density that naturally arises in pebble beds

PEBBLES: A COMPUTER CODE FOR MODELING PACKING, FLOW AND RECIRCULATIONOF PEBBLES IN A PEBBLE BED REACTOR

A comprehensive, high fidelity model for pebble flow has been developed and embodied in the PEBBLES computer code. In this paper, a description of the physical artifacts included in the model is presented and some results from using the computer code for predicting the features of pebble flow and packing in a realistic pebble bed reactor design are shown. The sensitivity of models to various physical parameters is also discussed

Development Status of the PEBBLES Code for Pebble Mechanics: Improved Physical Models and Speed-up

PEBBLES is a code for simulating the motion of all the pebbles in a pebble bed reactor. Since pebble bed reactors are packed randomly and not precisely placed, the location of the fuel elements in the reactor is not deterministically known. Instead, when determining operating parameters the motion of the pebbles can be simulated and stochastic locations can be found. The PEBBLES code can output information relevant for other simulations of the pebble bed reactors such as the positions of the pebbles in the reactor, packing fraction change in an earthquake, and velocity profiles created by recirculation. The goal for this level three milestone was to speedup the PEBBLES code through implementation on massively parallel computer. Work on this goal has resulted in speeding up both the single processor version and creation of a new parallel version of PEBBLES. Both the single processor version and the parallel running capability of the PEBBLES code have improved since the fiscal year start. The hybrid MPI/OpenMP PEBBLES version was created this year to run on the increasingly common cluster hardware profile that combines nodes with multiple processors that share memory and a cluster of nodes that are networked together. The OpenMP portions use the Open Multi-Processing shared memory parallel processing model to split the task across processors in a single node that shares memory. The Message Passing Interface (MPI) portion uses messages to communicate between different nodes over a network. The following are wall clock speed up for simulating an NGNP-600 sized reactor. The single processor version runs 1.5 times faster compared to the single processor version at the beginning of the fiscal year. This speedup is primarily due to the improved static friction model described in the report. When running on 64 processors, the new MPI/OpenMP hybrid version has a wall clock speed up of 22 times compared to the current single processor version. When using 88 processors, a speed up of 23 times is achieved. This speedup and other improvements of PEBBLES combine to make PEBBLES more capable and more useful for simulation of a pebble bed reactor. This report details the implementation and effects of the speedup work done over the course of the fiscal year

Advanced Core Design And Fuel Management For Pebble-Bed Reactors

A method for designing and optimizing recirculating pebble-bed reactor cores is presented. At the heart of the method is a new reactor physics computer code, PEBBED, which accurately and efficiently computes the neutronic and material properties of the asymptotic (equilibrium) fuel cycle. This core state is shown to be unique for a given core geometry, power level, discharge burnup, and fuel circulation policy. Fuel circulation in the pebble-bed can be described in terms of a few well?defined parameters and expressed as a recirculation matrix. The implementation of a few heat?transfer relations suitable for high-temperature gas-cooled reactors allows for the rapid estimation of thermal properties critical for safe operation. Thus, modeling and design optimization of a given pebble-bed core can be performed quickly and efficiently via the manipulation of a limited number key parameters. Automation of the optimization process is achieved by manipulation of these parameters using a genetic algorithm. The end result is an economical, passively safe, proliferation-resistant nuclear power plant

METHODS FOR MODELING THE PACKING OF FUEL ELEMENTS IN PEBBLE BED REACTORS

Two methods for the modeling of the packing of pebbles in the pebble bed reactors are presented and compared. The first method is based on random generation of potential centers for the pebbles, followed by rejection of points that are not compatible with the geometric constraint of no (or limited) pebbles overlap. The second method models the actual physical packing process, accounting for the dynamic of pebbles as they are dropped onto the pebble bed and as they settle therein. A simplification in the latter model is the assumption of a starting point with very dilute packing followed by settling. The results from the two models are compared and the properties of the second model and the dependence of its results on many of the modeling parameters are presented. The first model (with no overlap allowed) has been implemented into a code to compute Dancoff factors. The second model will soon be implemented into that same code and will also be used to model flow of pebbles in a reactor and core densification in the simulation of earthquakes. Both methods reproduce experimental values well, with the latter displaying a high level of fidelity

Performance of Trasuranic-Loaded Fully Ceramic Micro-Encapsulated Fuel in LWRs Interim Report, Including Void Reactivity Evaluation

The current focus of the Deep Burn Project is on once-through burning of transuranice (TRU) in light water reactors (LWRs). The fuel form is called Fully-Ceramic Micro-encapsulated (FCM) fuel, a concept that borrows the tri-isotropic (TRISO) fuel particle design from high-temperature reactor technology. In the Deep Burn LWR (DB-LWR) concept, these fuel particles would be pressed into compacts using SiC matrix material and loaded into fuel pins for use in conventional LWRs. The TRU loading comes from the spent fuel of a conventional LWR after 5 years of cooling. Unit cell calculations have been performed using the DRAGON-4 code in order assess the physics attributes of TRU-only FCM fuel in an LWR lattice. Depletion calculations assuming an infinite lattice condition were performed with calculations of various reactivity coefficients performed at each step. Unit cells containing typical UO2 and MOX fuel were analyzed in the same way to provide a baseline against which to compare the TRU-only FCM fuel. Loading of TRU-only FCM fuel into a pin without significant quantities of uranium challenges the design from the standpoint of several key reactivity parameters, particularly void reactivity, and to some degree, the Doppler coefficient. These unit cells, while providing an indication of how a whole core of similar fuel would behave, also provide information of how individual pins of TRU-only FCM fuel would influence the reactivity behavior of a heterogeneous assembly. If these FCM fuel pins are included in a heterogeneous assembly with LEU fuel pins, the overall reactivity behavior would be dominated by the uranium pins while attractive TRU destruction performance of the TRU-only FCM fuel pins may be preserved. A configuration such as this would be similar to CONFU assemblies analyzed in previous studies. Analogous to the plutonium content limits imposed on MOX fuel, some amount of TRU-only FCM pins in an otherwise-uranium fuel assembly may give acceptable reactivity performance. Assembly calculations will be performed in future work to explore the design options for heterogeneous assemblies of this type and their impact on reactivity coefficients