SCO2PE Operating Experience and Validation and Verification of KAIST_TMD

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Supercritical carbon dioxide (S-CO2) Brayton cycle has gaining attention due to its compactness and high efficiency at intermediate temperature range of turbine inlet temperature. Thus, many research groups have been trying to develop their own S-CO2 Brayton cycle technology or component design technology. KAIST research team has been trying to develop a S-CO2 turbomachinery design methodology. As a part of this effort, In-House code KAIST_TMD (KAIST Turbomachinery Design) was developed based on open literatures. KAIST_TMD can reflect real gas effect since it uses precise equations and property database rather than ideal gas assumptions. Most special characteristic of KAIST_TMD is that KAIST_TMD can design both of radial type and axial type turbomachineries so it can compare performance of both radial and axial turbomachineries under the same operating conditions. KAIST_TMD provides geometry of turbomachinery and off design performance map also. This research team built a S-CO2 Pump Experiment facility (SCO2PE) to experience the S-CO2 loop operation and to perform validation and verification of KAIST_TMD in near future. Canned motor pump and shell and tube type heat exchanger were installed as the main components of SCO2PE. Main objectives of this paper are to present preliminary experimental data and share the operating experience and troubleshooting of the facility. Data analysis and detailed discussions about an experimental procedure and major issues when pump operates near the critical point will be presented in the paper. As a result, preliminary data were obtained that can be used for improving the facility to increase accuracy of the data for future validation and verification of KAIST_TMD for radial compressor/pump design.