Suchergebnisse

A hot gas duct is an indispensable component for the nuclear-process heat applications of the Very-High-Temperature Reactor (VHTR), which has to fulfill three requirements: to withstand high temperature, high pressure, and large pressure transient. In this paper, numerical investigation of pressure transient is performed for a hot gas duct under rapid depressurization. System depressurization imposes an imploding pressure differential on the internal structural elements of a hot gas duct, the structural integrity of which is susceptible to being damaged. Pressure differential and its imposed duration, which are two key factors to evaluate the damage severity of a hot gas duct under depressurization, are examined in regard to depressurization rate and insulation packing tightness. It is revealed that depressurization rate is a decisive parameter for controlling the pressure differential and its duration, whereas insulating-packing tightness has little effect on them.

Natural circulation is an important process for primary loops of some marine integrated reactors. The reactor works under inclined conditions when severe accidents happen to the ship. In this paper, to investigate the characteristics of natural circulation, experiments were conducted in a symmetric loop under the inclined angle of 0~45°. A CFD model was also set up to predict the behaviors of the loop beyond the experimental scope. Total circulation flow rate decreases with the increase of inclined angle. Meanwhile one circulation is depressed while the other is enhanced, and accordingly the disparity between the branch circulations arises and increases with the increase of inclined angle. Circulation only takes place in one branch circuit at large inclined angle. Also based on the CFD model, the influences of flow resistance distribution and loop configuration on natural circulation are predicted. The numerical results show that to design the loop with the configuration of big altitude difference and small width, it is favorable to reduce the influence of inclination; however too small loop width will cause severe reduction of circulation ability at large angle inclination.

After emergency shutdown of high-temperature-gas-cooled reactor, the residual heat of the reactor core should be removed. As the natural circulation process spends too long period of time to be utilized, an active residual heat removal procedure is needed, which makes use of steam generator and start-up loop. During this procedure, the structure of steam generator may suffer cold/heat shock because of the sudden load of coolant or hot helium at the first few minutes. Transient analysis was carried out based on a one-dimensional mathematical model for steam generator and steam pipe of start-up loop to achieve safety and reliability. The results show that steam generator should be discharged and precooled; otherwise, boiling will arise and introduce a cold shock to the boiling tubes and tube sheet when coolant began to circulate prior to the helium. Additionally, in avoiding heat shock caused by the sudden load of helium, the helium circulation should be restricted to start with an extreme low flow rate; meanwhile, the coolant of steam generator (water) should have flow rate as large as possible. Finally, a four-step procedure with precooling process of steam generator was recommended; sensitive study for the main parameters was conducted.

Numerical simulation is performed to investigate the pressure distribution of helium gas under high pressure and high temperature for 10 MW High Temperature Gas-Cooled Reactor (HTGR-10). Experimental studies are first conducted on a self-built test system to investigate the static pressure distribution of a 90° elbow and validate the credibility of the computational approach. The 90° elbow is designed and manufactured geometrically the same as HTGR-10. Based on the experimental data, comparison of static pressure of inner wall and outer wall of 90° elbow with numerical results is carried out to verify the numerical approach. With high agreement between experimental results and numerical results of water flowing through 90° elbow, flow characteristics of helium gas under high pressure and high temperature are investigated on the confirmed numerical approach for flow measurement. And wall pressure distribution of eight cross sections of 90° elbow is given in detail to represent the entire region of the elbow.

The pebblebed-type high temperature gas-cooled reactor is considered to be one of the promising solutions for generation IV advanced reactors, and the two-region arranged reactor core can enhance its advantages by flattening neutron flux. However, this application is held back by the existence of mixing zone between central and peripheral regions, which results from pebbles' dispersion motions. In this study, experiments have been carried out to study the dispersion phenomenon, and the variation of dispersion region and radial distribution of pebbles in the specifically shaped flow field are shown. Most importantly, the standard deviation of pebbles' radial positions in dispersion region, as a quantitative index to describe the size of dispersion region, is gotten through statistical analysis. Besides, discrete element method has been utilized to analyze the parameter influence on dispersion region, and this practice offers some strategies to eliminate or reduce mixing zone in practical reactors.

A self-developed program was used to study the thermal-hydraulic behavior of an integral type reactor under heaving condition. Comparison of calculated results with the data of experiments performed on a natural circulation loop designed with reference to an integral type reactor of Tsinghua University in inclination, heaving, and rolling motions was carried out. Characteristics of natural circulation in heaving motion and effect of motion parameters on natural circulation were investigated. Results indicated that: (1) long-period heaving motion would lead to more significant influence than inclination and rolling motion; (2) it was an alternating force field which consisted of gravity and an additional force that decided the flow temperature and density difference of natural circulation; (3) effect of strengthkand cycleTof heaving motion on flow fluctuation of natural circulation and condensate depression of heating section outlet was performed.

The experimental method (side area method) and DEM simulation have been carried out to analyse the stagnant zone in the quasi-two-dimensional silos. The side area method is a phenomenological method by means of investigating the interface features of different areas composed of different coloured pebbles. Two methods have been discussed to define the stagnant zone. In particular, the area of the stagnant zone has been calculated with the mean-streamline method, and the tracking time of different marking pebbles has been investigated with the stagnant time method to explore the kinematics characteristics of the pebbles. The stagnant zone is crucial for the safety of the pebble-bed reactor, and the practical reactor core must avoid the existence of the stagnant zone. Furthermore, this paper also analyses the effects of bed configuration (the bed height, the base angle, and the friction coefficient) on stagnant zone with the two methods mentioned above. In detail, the bed height shows little impact on the stagnant zones when the bed height exceeds a certain limit, while the base angle has negative prominent correlation with the stagnant zone. The friction coefficient effect seems complicated and presents the great nonlinearity, which deserves to be deeply investigated.

Many tons of porous carbon materials (including BC and IG-110) are contained in HTGR, which are serving as structural material and fuel matrix material. These materials would absorb moisture and other impurities when exposed to the environment, and these impurities (especially moisture) absorbed in the carbon material must be removed before the reactor operation to prevent corrosion reaction at high temperature (more than 500°C). As the pore microscopic structure characteristic is the significant factor affecting the gas adsorption and flow in the porous materials, the detailed 3D pore structures of the carbon materials (BC and IG-110) in HTGR were studied by Micro-XCT and HPMI methods in this paper. These pore structure characteristics include pore geometry, pore size distribution, and pore throat connectivity. The test results show that the pore size distribution of BC material is wide, and the pore diameter is obviously larger than that of IG-110. Pore connections in BC show radial shape connections at some special points, and the pore connectivity in IG-110 is very complex and presents a huge complex 3D pore network.

A large number of carbon materials are adopted in high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR). These carbon materials mainly include graphite IG-110 and boron-containing carbon material (BC), both of which are typical porous materials and normally absorb moisture. In order to inhibit the chemical corrosion reaction between core internals materials and moisture, the core needs to be strictly dehumidified before the reactor is put into operation. This paper mainly analyzed the moisture transfer mechanism in these carbon materials. Moisture transfer models were developed, and the dehumidification process of HTR-PM core was simulated. In addition, the influence of working temperature and system pressure on dehumidification was studied as well.