Technical aspects of high converter reactors : proceedings of a Technical Committee meeting held in Nuremberg, 26-29 March 1990

COVER......Page 1 FOREWORD......Page 4 EDITORIAL NOTE......Page 5 CONTENTS......Page 6 SUMMARY OF THE TECHNICAL COMMITTEE MEETING......Page 8 Session 1: High Conversion Reactor (HCR) Concepts......Page 9 Session 2: High Conversion Reactor (HCR) Designs......Page 10 Session 3: Codes and Data Bases......Page 11 Session 4: Experiments......Page 12 Session 5: R & D Programmes......Page 13 Workshop Session 1: Reactor Physics......Page 14 Workshop Session 2: Thermal Hydraulics and Mechanical Design......Page 15 Workshop Session 3: Economic and Licensing Aspects of the HCR Introduction......Page 16 HIGH CONVERSION REACTOR (HCR) CONCEPTS (Session 1)......Page 18 RATIONALE FOR PRESSURIZED WATER HIGH CONVERSION REACTOR (PWHCR) DEVELOPMENT STRATEGY......Page 19 THE CONVERTIBLE SPECTRAL SHIFT REACTOR......Page 28 ANALYSIS OF WER CHARACTERISTICS WITH TIGHT LATTICE AND MOX FUEL......Page 44 THE CONCEPT OF AXIALLY HETEROGENEOUS HIGH CONVERSION LIGHT WATER REACTORS......Page 53 REFERENCE SESSR DESIGN......Page 64 FUEL CYCLE CALCULATIONS......Page 65 VERIFICATION OF NEUTRONIC METHODS......Page 68 REFERENCES......Page 69 PRELIMINARY PHYSICS DESIGN OF ADVANCED HEAVY WATER REACTORS (AHWRs)......Page 70 2. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE PRESENT PHWR SYSTEM......Page 71 4-. REQUIREMENTS TO BE SATISFIED BY THE ADVANCED REACTOR SYSTEM......Page 72 5. THE PHYSICS DESIGN : A QUALITATIVE DESCRIPTION......Page 73 6. CALCULATIONAL METHOD......Page 74 7. RESULTS......Page 75 FUEL CYCLE COST EVALUATION OF A HCPWR......Page 77 INTRODUCTION......Page 85 CONCEPTUAL DESIGN OF PLUTONIUM GENERATION BWR......Page 86 PERFORMANCE EVALUATION......Page 87 ACTINIDE TRANSMUTATION......Page 88 REFERENCES......Page 89 STEAM-WATER POWER REACTOR CONCEPT......Page 90 TECHNICAL ASPECTS OF THE SWPR CONCEPT......Page 91 POTENTIAL OF THE SWPR NUCLEAR SAFETY......Page 93 NEUTRON-PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS AND EFFICIENCY OP FUEL UTILIZATION......Page 95 BASIC RESULTS OF DEVELOPMENT WORKS......Page 96 REFERENCES......Page 97 2. Aspects of the SSET cycle implementation in a nuclear power system with CANDU reactors......Page 98 3. Establishing of the equilibrium conditions in the SSET cycle......Page 100 4. Solutions of increasing the burnup in the SSET reactor......Page 103 REFERENCES......Page 104 HIGH CONVERSION REACTOR (HCR) DESIGNS (Session 2)......Page 106 2. Topology and Symmetry......Page 107 3. The Advantages of a Triangular Fuel Rod Array......Page 108 4. The Reason for and the Advantages of Hexagonal Fuel Assemblies......Page 110 REFERENCES......Page 114 2. METHODS AND CODES USED......Page 115 4. NUCLEAR DESIGN......Page 116 NEUTRON PHYSICS AND THERMOHYDRAULICS DESIGN OF A REFERENCE HIGH CONVERSION PWR......Page 120 I INTRODUCTION......Page 121 II CHOICE OF THE REFERENCE APWR CORE GEOMETRY......Page 122 III THERMOHYDRAULIC OPTIMISATION AND DETERMINATION OF THE CORE HEIGHT......Page 124 IV NEUTRON PHYSICS CALCULATIONS......Page 125 REFERENCES......Page 129 1. Introduction......Page 130 2. Nuclear Design......Page 131 3. Thermal and Hydraulic Design......Page 133 5, Reactor Internals......Page 134 6. Safety Assessment......Page 135 REFERENCES......Page 136 2. Existing CHF Correlation for a Tight Lattice......Page 137 3 Critical Power Correlation for a Tight Pitch Fuel Lattice......Page 138 4 Test of the Correlation with Annulus Tube Test Data......Page 140 5. Estimation of HCBWR Critical Power Characteristics......Page 143 6 Conclusions......Page 144 REFERENCES......Page 145 1 Introduction......Page 146 2 Spacer design......Page 147 3 Super RCC and CR - Guide Structure......Page 148 4 Control Rod Ejection Lock......Page 150 BIBLIOGRAPHY......Page 151 2 Description of the reactor core and reflector geometries......Page 152 3 Method of calculation for the radiation field outside the core......Page 154 4 Gamma heating in the reflector of the high converter......Page 155 5 Reactor pressure vessel fluence......Page 156 6 Conclusion......Page 157 CODES AND DATA BASES (Session 3)......Page 158 1 Introduction.......Page 159 2 Calculation of infinite fuel arrays.......Page 160 3 Burmip calculations.......Page 166 4 Fuel assembly modelling.......Page 168 5 Whole core calculations.......Page 169 6 Summary.......Page 171 References......Page 172 2 HEXNOD - Static 3D Nodal Diffusion and Transport Theory Program for Hexagonal -z geometry......Page 174 4 Numerical Calculations for HTGR Benchmark Problems......Page 175 5 Benchmark Calculations for Thermal Reactors......Page 176 References......Page 180 THE CALCULATIONAL METHODOLOGY......Page 181 ANALYSIS OF THE THERMAL UO2-Pu02 CRITICAL EXPERIMENTS......Page 182 ANALYSIS OF THE PROTEUS LWHCR CORE 1......Page 185 REFERENCES......Page 187 1 Introduction......Page 188 2 Neutron Kinetics......Page 189 3 Thermal Hydraulics......Page 195 4 Coupling Neutron Kinetics and Thermal Hydraulics......Page 196 6 Application and Results......Page 197 References......Page 199 IMPROVEMENTS IN THE PREDICTION OF LWHCR LATTICE PARAMETERS......Page 200 3. Calculations! Methods and Data at the Start of PROTEUS Phase II......Page 201 4. Improvements of Codes and Data Libraries......Page 202 References......Page 207 II CRITICAL HEAT FLUX CORRELATION......Page 209 III DEVELOPMENT OF THE COMPUTER PROGRAMME FLUT-FDWR......Page 214 REFERENCES......Page 220 EXPERIMENTS (Session 4)......Page 223 1. CONTEXT OF THE FRENCH PROGRAMME......Page 224 2. CORE PHYSICS (Expérimental validations)......Page 225 3. THERMAHYDRAULICS......Page 233 2 The PROTEUS-LWHCR Phase II Cores Investigated to Date......Page 246 3 Measurement Techniques and Experimental Uncertainties......Page 248 5 Comparisons of Experiment and Calculation......Page 249 References......Page 252 STATUS OF TIGHT LATTICE THERMAL HYDRAULICS......Page 253 3. Phases of the design process and related codes......Page 254 4. Evaluation methods for CHF experiments......Page 256 5. Conclusions......Page 257 1. INTRODUCTION......Page 267 2. OBJECTIVES AND EXPERIMENTAL PROGRAM......Page 268 3. EXPERIMENTAL EQUIPMENT......Page 269 4. CHF FREON TEST RESULTS......Page 270 5. CONCLUSIONS AND FINAL REMARKS......Page 274 6. SUMMARY......Page 275 REFERENCES......Page 276 INTRODUCTION......Page 277 RESULTS......Page 278 REFERENCES......Page 281 2 NEPTUN Description......Page 282 4 Comparisons with Standard PWR Results......Page 284 5 NEPTUN-III Benchmark......Page 286 References......Page 288 R&D PROGRAMMES (Session 5)......Page 289 1. Introduction......Page 290 3. Theoretical and Experimental Cooperation Findings......Page 291 4. The Results......Page 292 5. Outlook on Further Activities......Page 293 REFERENCES......Page 294 OVERVIEW OF BELGIAN ACTIVITIES IN THE FRAME OF IMPROVED FUEL UTILIZATION AND HIGH CONVERSION REACTORS......Page 295 Purecycling studies......Page 296 APWR orientation studies......Page 297 Background and Project Motivation......Page 302 Calculations! Model......Page 303 Initial Results......Page 304 PROGRESS REPORT ON THE RESEARCH ACTIVITIES ON HIGH CONVERSION REACTORS AT THE CENTRO ATOMICO BARILOCHE, ARGENTINA......Page 305 REACTOR PHYSICS RESEARCH CONNECTED WITH THE LR-O REACTOR......Page 315 INTRODUCTION......Page 316 LR-O EXPERIMENTAL REACTOR......Page 317 SPECIAL FUEL......Page 319 REFERENCES......Page 321 LIST OF PARTICIPANTS......Page 323