Thermal Hydraulic Analysis Due to the Changes in Heat Removal for Advanced Heavy Water Reactor

Abstract

Advanced Heavy Water Reactor is natural circulation light water cooled and heavy water moderated pressure tube type of reactor. Changes in heat removal by primary heat transport system of a reactor have significant impact on various important system parameters like pressures, qualities, reactor power and flows. Increase in heat removal leads to Cooldown of the system subsequently reducing pressure, void increase and changes in power and flows of the system. Decrease in heat removal leads to warm-up of the system subsequently raising pressure, void collapse, and changes in power and flows of the system. The behaviour is complex as system under consideration is natural circulation system. Causes for events under category of increase in heat removal are mainly malfunctioning of feed water heaters, Isolation Condensers (IC) inlet valves and controllers. These events lead to cooldown of system and addition of positive reactivity addition due to void collapse. Various events considered are Feed Water System malfunctions that result in decrease in feed water temperature, inadvertent opening of IC valve, Failure of PHT Pressure Control System and Decrease in pressure controller set point to 67 bars. Causes for events under category of decrease in heat removal are mainly malfunctioning of controllers, feedwater valves and operating events like turbine trip. Functioning of passive cooling system and different valves play important role for these events. These events lead to increase in system pressure. Various events considered are Loss of normal feed water flow (multiple trains), Turbine trip without bypass without IC, Turbine trip without bypass with IC, Turbine trip with bypass without IC, Increase in PHT pressure controller set point, Decrease in level controller set point, Turbine Trip with setback, Decrease in steam flow and Class IV power failure. Changes in the system voids and pressures as a result of change in the heat removal leads to complex reactivity feedback due to coolant temperatures, void fraction and fuel temperatures. These changes in the reactor power together with void distribution change affect two-phase natural circulation flow. This paper brings out these aspects. It discusses descretisation of the system and brings out various design aspects. In this paper summary of analysis for each event is presented, various modeling complexities are brought out, evaluation of acceptance criteria is made and design implications of each event is discussed.