Thermal–Hydraulic Analysis and Optimization of HCPB Breeder Unit for Future Fusion Reactor

Abstract

China has proposed several concepts of breeder blanket for future fusion reactor, one of which is the helium-cooled pebble bed (HCPB) blanket. HCPB blanket is a cellular design with solid breeder units (BUs) and other structural components to achieve its functional requirements. BU of the HCPB blanket consists of lithium ceramic breeders and beryllium pebble beds separated by cooling plates (CPs). Thermal–hydraulic analyses using ANSYS CFX have been done to measure the thermal performance of the designed BUs. The temperature distribution in structural and functional materials is obtained and cooling optimization is proposed according to the computational results. Results of BU cooling optimization indicate that the bed temperature is high enough to realize a good tritium release and extraction environment meanwhile maximum temperatures of different materials meet their thermal limits well. Details of BU thermal hydraulic analysis and cooling optimization are presented in this paper.