Study on Control Strategy of Hydrogen Risk in Small Containment Under Severe Accident

Abstract

Hydrogen combustion or detonation happened in the containment within the process of the small reactor severe accident may threaten the integrity of the containment. In this paper, based on systemic design of the Small Modular Reactor (SMR) surrounded by the steel containment, an innovatory combustible gas control strategy which using the passive containment cooling system (PCCS) and passive autocatalytic recombiners (PARs) is made to control the hydrogen risk in the small steel containment. A severe accident hydrogen risk analysis model is built by the integrative severe accident analysis program MELCOR, the validity of the strategy is analyzed at a typical severe accident. With this understanding, a three-dimensional computed fluid dynamics hydrogen behavior analysis model of the small steel containment is established by GASFLOW code, and the gas distribution non-uniformity in the containment is analyzed. The result shows that the steam condensation process in the containment could be slowed down by controlling the action of PCCS, and the steam concentration in the containment could be in the range of high level, while the oxygen concentration could be in the range of low level. If the PARs were added, the PARs could consume the hydrogen and oxygen in the containment sustainedly. The containment atmosphere could be in an inerted condition during the accident process, even though the hydrogen concentration in the containment is high. The gas distribution non-uniformity analysis result shows that oxygen concentration was low in the extent of high hydrogen concentration and high steam concentration, the steam, oxygen and hydrogen distribution non-uniformity would not affect the inerted atmosphere of containment.