Pebble Bed High Temperature Gas Research Articles

Measurement of Helium and Xenon Knudsen permeability in graphite IG-11

Understanding the flow and diffusion (transport) of gases through nuclear graphite is of interest in both the prismatic and pebble bed high-temperature gas reactors (HTGRs), for normal operation and under accident conditions, for example, as related to graphite oxidation. Both the laminar and turbulent gaseous transport are of interest. It has also been noted that nuclear graphite can have pore sizes that can possibly lead to non-continuum transport, as the pore size can be comparable to the gaseous mean free path. We report measurements and analyzes of experiments performed with IG-11 graphite in the pressure range of 10 Pa to 14,700 Pa, 293 K, using Helium, and research grade xenon (99.999%), respectively. These values are in fair agreement with those reported for different graphites and gases by other investigators, but are also higher by six orders of magnitude than those reported for Kr permeability in a developmental very low permeability graphite-HXT-90. Our measured ratio of the Helium and Xenon permeabilities is about 4, different from mXemHe≈5.72 that corresponds to diffuse reflection at the graphite surface for both gases. Simple analysis indicates that the two gases have slightly different accommodation coefficients (about 25%) with the graphite surface. However, there could also be other reasons, such as experimental uncertainties or the need for a more detailed analysis.

Performance analysis of the closed Brayton power cycle in a small-scale pebble bed gas cooled reactor using different working fluids

A performance analysis is carried out for a 60 MWth Advanced Atomic Cogenerator for Industrial Applications that is a pebble bed high-temperature gas cooled reactor with an indirect Brayton power conversion system. Four different gases viz. air, CO2, N2 and He were studied as secondary cycle working fluids. Specific work output and power generation efficiency are calculated. In addition, the total thermal efficiency for the steam production process is estimated. Our results indicate that over a wide range of some operating conditions, helium gives the highest power generation efficiency, while N2 and air provide a better specific power output. Finally, the highest cogeneration-steaming rate was noticed for the CO2 cycle.

Neutronics calculation methods for the first core of the pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor

Neutronics calculation methods for the first core of the pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor

Analysis of Precooling Injection Transient of Steam Generator for High Temperature Gas Cooled Reactor

After a postulated design basis accident leads high temperature gas cooled reactor to emergency shutdown, steam generator still remains with high temperature level and needs to be cooled down by a precooling before reactor restarts with clearing of fault. For the large difference of coolant temperature between inlet and outlet of steam generator in normal operation, the temperature distribution on the components of steam generator is very complicated. Therefore, the temperature descending rate of the components in steam generator needs to be limited to avoid the potential damage during the precooling stage. In this paper, a pebble-bed high temperature gas cooled reactor is modeled by thermal-hydraulic system analysis code and several postulated precooling injection transients are simulated and compared to evaluate their effects, which will provide support for the precooling design. The analysis results show that enough precooling injection is necessary to satisfy the precooling requirements, and larger mass flow rate of precooling water injection will accelerate the precooling process. The temperature decrease of steam generator is related to the precooling injection scenarios, and the maximal mass flow rate of the precooling injection should be limited to avoid the excessively quick temperature change of the structures in steam generator.

Experimental study of flow field characteristics on bed configurations in the pebble bed reactor

The flow field characteristics are of fundamental importance in the design work of the pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor (HTGR). The different effects of bed configurations on the flow characteristics of pebble bed are studied through the PTV (Particle Tracking Velocimetry) experiment. Some criteria, e.g. flow uniformity (σ) and mass flow level (α), are proposed to estimate vertical velocity field and compare the bed configurations. The distribution of the Δθ (angle difference between the individual particle velocity and the velocity vector sum of all particles) is also used to estimate the resultant motion consistency level. Moreover, for each bed configuration, the thickness of displacement is analyzed to measure the effect of the funnel flow zone based on the boundary layer theory. Detailed information shows the quantified characteristics of bed configuration effects on flow uniformity and other characteristics; and the sequence of levels of each estimation criterion is obtained for all bed configurations. In addition, a good design of the pebble bed configuration is suggested and these estimation criteria can be also applied and adopted in testing other geometry designs of pebble bed.

Improvement of discontinuity factor for strong absorber region

At Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology (INET) the discontinuity factor corrected diffusion method with the homogenization technology was developed and applied in the control rod worth calculation of the pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor. But the result with the normal procedure is not accurate enough for a strong absorber. The numerical analysis shows that the strong absorber still has great influence on the flux distribution in the nearby graphite region, so that the flux distribution obtained by the normal diffusion method does not agree with the transport result. Thus, two improvements were proposed in this paper. First, instead of the neutron flux in the middle of the fine mesh, the surface flux of the absorber region was calculated through the net current in the boundary of the region; and then, while the discontinuity factor of the homogenized absorber region should be calculated, the discontinuity factor of the neighboring graphite region on the other side of the interface should also be calculated to eliminate the influence of the strong absorber. The numerical results demonstrate that, based on the improved method, the accuracy of heterogeneous transport calculation can be achieved by a diffusion calculation.

HTR steady state and transient thermal analyses

A thermal model to simulate the steady state and transient behavior of the 10 MW pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor (HTR-10) is presented in this work. The helium cooled HTR-10 was designed, constructed and operated by the Institute of Nuclear and New Energy Technology (INET), in China. In this study, a simulation is performed using the RELAP5 code. In the simulation, results of temperature distribution within the pebble bed, inlet and outlet coolant temperatures, coolant mass flow, and others parameters have been compared with the data available in a benchmark document published by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 2013. The simulation is demonstrated to be in good agreement, showing that the developed model is capable of reproducing the thermal behavior of the HTR-10 in steady state and transient operation conditions.

Investigation on the pebble bed flow model in VSOP

In pebble bed high temperature gas cooled reactor (HTR), the fuel pebbles will pass the reactor core several times, in order to flatten the power distribution, and to unify the discharging burnup. But the VSOP code approximates the pebble bed flow because of current computer capability. In order to simulate the pebble bed flow in HTR more realistically and to validate the approximation in pebble bed flow model in VSOP, a new code based on Monte Carlo method has been developed to analysis the characteristic of the pebble bed flow, particularly the average burnup distribution in the core, discharging burnup, and the number of pebble passes. Statistics analysis shows that several millions of Monte Carlo simulation can provide reasonable result and the VSOP treatment of the pebble bed flow model is reasonable. The Monte Carlo simulation can provide more information for the pebble flow and reactor operation.

The Transient 3-D Transport Coupled Code TORT-TD/ATTICA3D for High-Fidelity Pebble-Bed HTGR Analyses

This article describes the 3D discrete ordinates–based coupled code system TORT-TD/ATTICA3D that aims at steady state and transient analyses of pebble-bed high-temperature gas cooled reactors. In view of increasing computing power, the application of time-dependent neutron transport methods becomes feasible for best estimate evaluations of safety margins. The calculation capabilities of TORT-TD/ATTICA3D are presented along with the coupling approach, with focus on the time-dependent neutron transport features of TORT-TD. Results obtained for the OECD/NEA/NSC PBMR-400 benchmark demonstrate the transient capabilities of TORT-TD/ATTICA3D.