Abstract
This paper presents the results of an integrated chemical effects experiment of head loss across the sump pump screen with fibrous debris bed over a non-prototypical 10-day post-LOCA incident window. The corrosion head loss experiments (CHLE) is a reduced scaled integral effects testing facility built at the University of New Mexico (UNM) to investigate potential chemical effects on head loss across prepared fibrous debris beds. The results in this paper come from two integral effect tests performed at UNM in order to determine the chemical effects on head loss induced by a zinc source effect and an aluminum precipitation effect (T3: without Zn source case, T4: with Zn source case in containment). The tests were performed with a large surface area of aluminum coupons in the testing facility for an extended period of elevated temperature to accelerate corrosion above that expected under prototypical conditions. These conditions were sufficient to force aluminum precipitation to occur and induce the onset of chemical effects on debris bed head loss. The head loss behavior on two different types of fiber debris beds (blender-processed and NEI-processed debris bed) was evaluated in this study. It was found that the blender-processed bed is much more sensitive in filtering than the NEI-processed bed and consequently had a much higher head loss value across the beds. Aluminum precipitation was observed, with aluminum concentration and turbidity measurements, to form starting on day 7 in Test T3 and on day 6 in Test T4. The onset of aluminum precipitation-induced head loss increase was observed in a similar time frame in both CHLE T3 and T4 tests. In addition, the results of surface analysis (XPS, SEM-EDS) for the tested fiberglass bed are presented.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have