Separate and integral effect tests of aerosol retention in steam generator during tube rupture accident

Abstract

A steam generator tube rupture accompanying a core damage may cause the fission product to be released to environment bypassing the containment. In such an accident, the steam generator is the major path of the radioactive aerosol release.AEOLUS facility, the scaled-down model of Korean type steam generator, was built to examine the aerosol removal in the steam generator during the steam generator tube rupture accident. Integral and separate effect tests were performed with the facility for the dry and flooded conditions, and the decontamination factors were presented for different tube configurations and submergences.The dry test results were compared with the existing test results and with the analyses to investigate the aerosol retention physics by the tube bundle, with respect to the particle size and the bundle geometry. In the flooded tests, the effect of submergence were shown and the retention in the jet injection region were presented with respect to the Stokes number.The test results are planned to be used to constitute the aerosol retention model, specifically applicable for the analysis of the steam generator tube rupture accident in Korean nuclear power plants to evaluate realistic fission product behavior.

Keywords

• Steam generator tube rupture (SGTR)
• Aerosol retention
• Decontamination factor (DF)
• Tube bundle
• AEOLUS facility
• Submergence