Experimental investigation of liquid entrainment in vertical up tee branch with double-end gas inlets

Abstract

Tee branches are widely used in nuclear power plants for varying purposes. The tee branch is adopted by the fourth stage Automatic Depressurization System (ADS-4) in Westinghouse AP600/AP1000 to depressurize the primary loop during the small break loss of coolant accident (SBLOCA). However, large amount of coolant will be entrained simultaneously through the ADS-4 branch which poses the threat of core uncovering and melting. Visualization experiments with double-end gas inlets were conducted to investigate the ADS-4 tee branch entrainment phenomena in AP1000. Entrainment process were recorded by high speed camera and analyzed in detail. The onset of liquid entrainment and entrainment rate data were obtained and compared with existing data and correlations, and discrepancies were found in the comparison due to the difference of test section geometric configuration. The gas flow rate has little effect on the branch quality at the same dimensionless gas chamber height in entrainment rate tests. The entrainment frequency was also studied. The test data reveal that the entrainment period decreases rapidly with the increase of entrainment rate in low range of the entrainment rate, and gradually stabilizes in high range of the entrainment rate.