European Lead Fast Reactor - ELSY

The conceptual design of the European Lead Fast Reactor is being developed starting from September 2006, in the frame of the EU-FP6-ELSY project.The ELSY (European Lead-cooled System) reference design is a 600 MWe pool-type reactor cooled by pure lead. The ELSY project demonstrates the possibility of designing a competitive and safe fast critical reactor using simple engineered technical features, while fully complying with the Generation IV goal of sustainability and minor actinide (MA) burning capability. Sustainability was a leading criterion for option selection for core design, focusing on the demonstration of the potential to be self sustaining in plutonium and to burn its own generated MAs. To this end, different core configurations have been studied. Economics was a leading criterion for primary system design and plant layout. The use of a compact and simple primary circuit with the additional objective that all internal components be removable, are among the reactor features intended to assure competitive electric energy generation and long-term investment protection. Low capital cost and construction time are pursued through simplicity and compactness of the reactor building (reduced footprint and height). The reduced plant footprint is one of the benefits coming from the elimination of the Intermediate Cooling System, the low reactor building height is the result of the design approach which foresees the adoption of short-height components and two innovative Decay Heat Removal (DHR) systems. Among the critical issues, the impact of the large mass of lead has been carefully analyzed; it has been demonstrated that the high density of lead can be mitigated by compact solutions and adoption of seismic isolators. Safety has been one of the major focuses all over the ELSY development. In addition to the inherent safety advantages of lead coolant (high boiling point and no exothermic reactions with air or water) a high safety grade of the overall system has been reached. In fact the overall primary system has been conceived in order to minimize pressure drops and, as a consequence, to allow decay heat removal by natural circulation. Moreover two redundant, diverse and passive operated DHR systems have been developed and adopted. The paper presents the overall work performed so far.JRC.F.4-Safety of future nuclear reactor

ELSY - The European Lead Fast Reactor

The European Lead Fast Reactor is being developed starting from September 2006, in the frame of the ELSY (European Lead SYstem) project funded by the Sixth Framework Programme of EURATOM. The project, coordinated by Ansaldo Nucleare, involves a wide consortium of European organizations. The ELSY reference design is a 600 MWe pool-type reactor cooled by pure lead. The ELSY project demonstrates the possibility of designing a competitive and safe fast critical reactor using simple engineered technical features, whilst fully complying with the Generation IV goal of sustainability and minor actinide (MA) burning capability. The main objectives of the ELSY project are to show that: - the adopted innovative design and technology achieves the high safety standards, which would be required at the time of their deployment, - the fuel cycle can be closed, - the non-proliferation resistance is enhanced, - a high availability factor is reached, - the economic competitiveness target is reached, - the design is compliant with GIF goals Sustainability was a leading criterion for option selection for core design, focusing on the demonstration of the potential to be self sustaining in plutonium and to burn its own generated MAs. To this end, different core configurations have been studied and compared. Economics was a leading criterion for primary system design and plant layout. The use of a compact and simple primary circuit with the additional objective that all internal components be removable, are among the reactor features intended to assure competitive electric energy generation and long-term investment protection. Low capital cost and construction time are pursued through simplicity and compactness of the reactor building (reduced footprint and height). The reduced plant footprint is one of the benefits coming from the elimination of the Intermediate Cooling System, the low reactor building height is the result of the design approach which foresees the adoption of short-height components and two innovative passively operated DHR (Decay Heat Removal) systems. Among the critical issues, the impact of the large mass of lead has been carefully analyzed; notwithstanding it has been demonstrated that the high density of lead can be mitigated by more compact solutions and improvement of the design of the Reactor Vessel support system, i.e. the adoption of seismic isolators for a full seismic-resistant design. Preliminary results of the reactor vessel and supports stress analysis indicate that an LFR larger than a medium-size plant (in the IAEA classification) is potentially feasible. Safety has been one of the major focus all over the ELSY development. In addition to the inherent safety advantages of lead coolant like high boiling point and no exothermic reactions with air or water, a high safety grade of the overall system has been reached. In fact overall primary system has been conceived in order to minimize pressure drops and, as a consequence, to allow decay heat removal by natural circulation (note that this feature is essential for the unprotected loss of flow transient). Moreover two redundant, diverse and passive operated DHR systems have been developed and adopted. The ELSY primary system configuration is shown in Figure 1. The paper focuses on the main aspects of the proposed design for the European Lead Fast Reactor highlighting the innovation of this reactor concept, overall objectives as well as future developments. Safety features of the proposed Decay Heat Removal systems will be shortly presented.JRC.F.4-Nuclear Reactor Integrity Assessment and Knowledge Managemen

European Lead Fast Reactor (ELSY and LEADER projects)

The European Lead Fast Reactor is being developed starting from September 2006, in the frame of the ELSY project sponsored by the Sixth Framework Programme of EURATOM. The project, coordinated by Ansaldo Nucleare, involves a wide consortium of European organizations. The ELSY reference design is a 600 MWe pool-type reactor cooled by pure lead. The ELSY project demonstrates the possibility of designing a competitive and safe fast critical reactor using simple engineered technical features, whilst fully complying with the Generation IV goal of sustainability and minor actinide (MA) burning capability. Sustainability was a leading criterion for option selection for core design, focusing on the demonstration of the potential to be self sustaining in plutonium and to burn its own generated MAs. To this end, different core configurations have been studied and compared. Economics was a leading criterion for primary system design and plant layout. The use of a compact and simple primary circuit with the additional objective that all internal components be removable, are among the reactor features intended to assure competitive electric energy generation and long-term investment protection. Low capital cost and construction time are pursued through simplicity and compactness of the reactor building (reduced footprint and height). The reduced plant footprint is one of the benefits coming from the elimination of the Intermediate Cooling System, the low reactor building height is the result of the design approach which foresees the adoption of short-height components and two innovative DHR systems. Among the critical issues, the impact of the large mass of lead has been carefully analyzed; notwithstanding it has been demonstrated that the high density of lead can be mitigated by more compact solutions and improvement of the design of the Reactor Vessel support system, i.e. the adoption of seismic isolators for a full seismic-resistant design. Preliminary results of the reactor vessel and supports stress analysis indicate that an LFR larger than a medium-size plant (in the IAEA classification) is potentially feasible. Safety has been one of the major focus all over the ELSY development. In addition to the inherent safety advantages of lead coolant like high boiling point and no exothermic reactions with air or water, a high safety grade of the overall system has been reached. In fact overall primary system has been conceived in order to minimize pressure drops and, as a consequence, to allow decay heat removal by natural circulation. Moreover two redundant, diverse and passive operated DHR systems have been developed and adopted. The ELSY project was organised into 6 technical plus one coordination work packages. The paper presents the overall work performed so far in the different areas.JRC.F.4-Nuclear Reactor Integrity Assessment and Knowledge Managemen

The ELSY Project

This paper presents the current status of the development of ELSY (the acronym for the European Lead-cooled System). The ELSY reference design is a 600 MWe pool-type reactor cooled by pure lead. This concept is under development since September 2006, and is sponsored by the Sixth Framework Programme of EURATOM. The ELSY project, coordinated by Ansaldo Nucleare, is being performed by a consortium consisting of twenty organizations including seventeen from Europe, two from Korea and one from the USA. The partners are from industry, research organisations and universities. ELSY aims to demonstrate the possibility of designing a fast critical reactor using simple engineered technical features, whilst fully complying with the Generation IV goals of sustainability, economics, safety, proliferation resistant and physical protection. Compactness of the reactor building is possible due to the elimination of the Intermediate Cooling System, and the adoption of innovative DHR systems. Among the critical issues, the effect of the large mass of lead has been considered; this assessment allows being very confident in the feasibility of the reactor vessel and its support.JRC.F.4-Nuclear design safet

Le Potentiel du LFR et du Projet ELSY - The Potential of the LFR and the ELSY Project

This paper presents the current status of the development of the Lead-cooled Fast Reactor (LFR) in support of Generation IV (GEN IV) Nuclear Energy Systems. The approach being taken by the GIF plan is to address the research priorities of each member state in developing an integrated and coordinated research program to achieve common objectives, while avoiding duplication of effort. The integrated plan being prepared by the LFR Provisional System Steering Committee of the GIF, known as the LFR System Research Plan (SRP) recognizes two principal technology tracks for pursuit of LFR technology: - a small, transportable system of 10-100 MWe size that features a very long refueling interval, - a larger-sized system rated at about 600 MWe, intended for central station power generation and waste transmutation. This paper, in particular, describes the ongoing activities to develop the Small Secure Transportable Autonomous Reactor (SSTAR) and the European Lead-cooled SYstem (ELSY), the two research initiatives closely aligned with the overall tracks of the SRP, and outlines the Proliferation-resistant Environment-friendly Accident-tolerant Continual & Economical Reactors (PEACER) conceived with particular focus on burning/transmuting of long-lived TRU waste and fission fragments of concern, such as Tc and I. The current reference design for the SSTAR is a 20 MWe natural circulation pool-type reactor concept with a small shippable reactor vessel. Specific features of the lead coolant, the nitride fuel containing transuranics, the fast spectrum core, and the small size combine to promote a unique approach to achieve proliferation resistance, while also enabling fissile self-sufficiency, autonomous load following, simplicity of operation, reliability, transportability, as well as a high degree of passive safety. Conversion of the core thermal power into electricity at a high plant efficiency of 44 % is accomplished utilizing a supercritical carbon dioxide Brayton cycle power converter. The ELSY reference design is a 600 MWe pool-type reactor cooled by pure lead. This concept has been under development since September 2006, and is sponsored by the Sixth Framework Programme of EURATOM. The ELSY project is being performed by a consortium consisting of twenty organizations including seventeen from Europe, two from Korea and one from the USA. ELSY aims to demonstrate the possibility of designing a competitive and safe fast critical reactor using simple engineered technical features while fully complying with the Generation IV goal of minor actinide (MA) burning capability. The use of a compact and simple primary circuit with the additional objective that all internal components be removable, are among the reactor features intended to assure competitive electric energy generation and long-term investment protection. Simplicity is expected to reduce both the capital cost and the construction time; these are also supported by the compactness of the reactor building (reduced footprint and height). The reduced footprint would be possible due to the elimination of the Intermediate Cooling System, the reduced elevation is the of the design approach of reduced height components.JRC.F.4-Nuclear Reactor Integrity Assessment and Knowledge Managemen

Status and trend of core design activities for heavy metal cooled accelerator driven system

International audienceDuring the 5th Framework Program (FP5) the European Commission (EC) funded the PDS-XADS project (PreliminaryDesign Studies on an eXperimental Accelerator Driven System) mainly devoted to the demonstration of the feasibilityof the coupling among an accelerator, a spallation target and a subcritical core, and to preliminarily investigate the conditionsfor enhancing the transmutation rate at values suitable for an industrial-scale transmuter.The on-going activities of the FP6 EUROTRANS integrated project (EUROpean research programme for TRANSmutationof high level nuclear waste in an accelerator driven system) are in continuity with the PDS-XADS project objectives,but with a significant change for what concerns the final goal in terms of demonstration level. In fact they are oriented toboth the design of an industrial-scale transmuter (EFIT) and a small experiment facility (XT-ADS), serving as a test benchfor as much component technologies as possible in a realistic irradiation environment.The paper describes the main results of the design activities for the large and small LBE-cooled cores performed withinPDS-XADS project and discusses the constraints (e.g. those deriving from the spallation target and the accelerator), therequirements (such as the degree of subcriticality when operating at power as well as during refuelling), the design criteriaand choices with the purpose to verify their applicability to new designs (EFIT, XT-ADS)

Code assessment and modelling for Design Basis Accident analysis of the European Sodium Fast Reactor design. Part II: Optimised core and representative transients analysis

The new reactor concepts proposed in the Generation IV International Forum require the development and validation of computational tools able to assess their safety performance. In the first part of this paper the models of the ESFR design developed by several organisations in the framework of the CP-ESFR project were presented and their reliability validated via a benchmarking exercise. This second part of the paper includes the application of those tools for the analysis of design basis accident (DBC) scenarios of the reference design. Further, this paper also introduces the main features of the core optimisation process carried out within the project with the objective to enhance the core safety performance through the reduction of the positive coolant density reactivity effect. The influence of this optimized core design on the reactor safety performance during the previously analysed transients is also discussed. The conclusion provides an overview of the work performed by the partners involved in the project towards the development and enhancement of computational tools specifically tailored to the evaluation of the safety performance of the Generation IV innovative nuclear reactor designs.JRC.F.5-Nuclear Reactor Safety Assessmen