Nuclear Engineering and Technology (Dec 2022)
Analysis of activated colloidal crud in advanced and modular reactor under pump coastdown with kinetic corrosion
Abstract
The analysis of rapid flow transients in Reactor Coolant Pumps (RCP) is essential for a reactor safety study. An accurate and precise analysis of the RCP coastdown is necessary for the reactor design. The coastdown of RCP affects the coolant temperature and the colloidal crud in the primary coolant. A realistic and kinetic model has been used to investigate the behavior of activated colloidal crud in the primary coolant and steam generator that solves the pump speed analytically. The analytic solution of the non-dimensional flow rate has been determined by the energy ratio β. The kinetic energy of the coolant fluid and the kinetic energy stored in the rotating parts of a pump are two essential parameters in the form of β. Under normal operation, the pump's speed and moment of inertia are constant. However, in a coastdown situation, kinetic damping in the interval has been implemented. A dynamic model ACCP-SMART has been developed for System Integrated Modular and Advanced Reactor (SMART) to investigate the corrosion due to activated colloidal crud. The Fickian diffusion model has been implemented as the reference corrosion model for the constituent component of the primary loop of the SMART reactor. The activated colloidal crud activity in the primary coolant and steam generator of the SMART reactor has been studied for different equilibrium corrosion rates, linear increase in corrosion rate, and dynamic RCP coastdown situation energy ratio β. The coolant specific activity of SMART reactor equilibrium corrosion (4.0 mg s−1) has been found 9.63 × 10−3 μCi cm−3, 3.53 × 10−3 μC cm−3, 2.39 × 10−2 μC cm−3, 8.10 × 10−3 μC cm−3, 6.77 × 10−3 μC cm−3, 4.95 × 10−4 μC cm−3, 1.19 × 10−3 μC cm−3, and 7.87 × 10−4 μC cm−3 for 24Na, 54Mn, 56Mn, 59Fe, 58Co, 60Co, 99Mo, and 51Cr which are 14.95%, 5.48%, 37.08%, 12.57%, 10.51%, 0.77%, 18.50%, and 0.12% respectively. For linear and exponential coastdown with a constant corrosion rate, the total coolant and steam generator activity approaches a higher saturation value than the normal values. The coolant and steam generator activity changes considerably with kinetic corrosion rate, equilibrium corrosion, growth of corrosion rate (ΔC/Δt), and RCP coastdown situations. The effect of the RCP coastdown on the specific activity of the steam generators is smeared by linearly rising corrosion rates, equilibrium corrosion, and rapid coasting down of the RCP. However, the time taken to reach the saturation activity is also influenced by the slope of corrosion rate, coastdown situation, equilibrium corrosion rate, and energy ratio β.
