A state of art review of instability in parallel channels of supercritical fluid in nuclear applications

Abstract

In Generation-IV nuclear reactors, the idea of supercritical fluid reactors (SFRs) is one of the most advanced reactors. The research on flow instabilities at subcritical and supercritical pressure has gained much attention in the last few years due to its development capability in heat transfer systems of industries. Flow instability is one of the significant causes that decrease the reactor's efficiency, performance, and life. As a result, flow instability should always be considered in the nuleacr power plants (NPP). Most of the reported research is based on the numerical simulation on a single channel due to simplicity. But, flow instability in the parallel channel studies is very limited in literature, and maybe in the future, most researchers will work in this area to design the SCFRs core. To understand the phenomena of flow instability in the parallel channel and their effect on the design and safety feature, a brief review of the flow instability in the parallel channel of the supercritical water reactor (SCWR) is presented in this paper.