Abstract
There are currently around 78 nuclear power plants (NPPs) in the world based on Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs). The current parameter to assess BWR instability issues is the linear Decay Ratio (DR). However, it is well known that BWRs are complex non-linear dynamical systems that may even exhibit chaotic dynamics that normally preclude the use of the DR when the BWR is working at a specific operating point during instability. In this work a novel methodology based on an adaptive Shannon Entropy estimator and on Noise Assisted Empirical Mode Decomposition variants is presented. This methodology was developed for real-time implementation of a stability monitor. This methodology was applied to a set of signals stemming from several NPPs reactors (Ringhals-Sweden, Forsmark-Sweden and Laguna Verde-Mexico) under commercial operating conditions, that experienced instabilities events, each one of a different nature.
Highlights
There are 78 nuclear boiling water reactors (BWRs) in use around the world for the generation of electricity
The method we propose is based on the Hilbert–Huang transform (HHT) and it estimates a parameter associated to BWR stability, in this case the previously mentioned
We describe the methodologies dedicated to estimate the Shannon Entropy, a measure that fulfills the role of a novel non-linear BWR stability indicator
Summary
There are 78 nuclear boiling water reactors (BWRs) in use around the world for the generation of electricity. There are still fundamental aspects in its operation related to the interaction of thermohydraulic processes (heat transfer in fuel and refrigerant) with the neutron kinetics process. Such interaction may, under certain operating conditions, cause BWR to malfunction and affect its stability. Refinement of fuel elements has encouraged the introduction of increasingly efficient fuels that allow the plant to operate at increasingly high power levels. Such a power increase induces a higher reactivity feedback and a decrease in response time, resulting in a lower BWR stability range when the plant
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