Thermal analysis of prismatic gas-cooled reactor core under coolant channel blockage accidents

Abstract

Limited results of studies on coolant channel blockage accidents in a prismatic-gas cooled reactor core are available, although coolant channel blockage of the fuel block in a prismatic gas-cooled reactor has been regarded as a highly important phenomenon. In this study, therefore, intensive and extensive thermal analyses were carried out to enhance the understanding and knowledge about the thermal performance of multi-hole type prismatic fuel blocks under coolant channel blockage accidents. A series of thermo-fluid calculations were performed using the CORONA code. In contrast to existing works, a full core model was used to consider an accurate coolant flow redistribution after the blockage in this work. The results of the CORONA calculations show that the single channel blockage accidents of PMR200 are not a safety concern regardless of the location. However, the maximum fuel temperature exceeds the safety limit in the case of more than ∼10 channel blockage at the same region of the fuel column. It was also found that the selection of the computational domain is crucial. A full core analysis is required for accurate results in the case of severe blockage accidents.