Open AccessAssessment of water hammer effects on boiling water nuclear reactor core dynamics
Author(s) -
Anis Bousbia-Salah
Publication year - 2007
Publication title -
nuclear technology and radiation protection
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.31
H-Index - 16
eISSN - 1452-8185
pISSN - 1451-3994
DOI - 10.2298/ntrp0701018b
Subject(s) - water hammer , mechanics , excursion , boiling water reactor , boiling , amplitude , nuclear engineering , transient (computer programming) , materials science , nuclear reactor core , void (composites) , core (optical fiber) , nuclear reactor , environmental science , thermodynamics , physics , computer science , engineering , quantum mechanics , political science , law , composite material , operating system
Complex phenomena, as water hammer transients, occurring in nuclear power plants are still not very well investigated by the current best estimate computational tools. Within this frame work, a rapid positive reactivity addition into the core generated by a water hammer transient is considered. The numerical simulation of such phenomena was carried out using the coupled RELAP5/PARCS code. An over all data comparison shows good agreement between the calculated and measured core pressure wave trends. However, the predicted power response during the excursion phase did not correctly match the experimental tendency. Because of this, sensitivity studies have been carried out in order to identify the most influential parameters that govern the dynamics of the power excursion. After investigating the pressure wave amplitude and the void feed back responses, it was found that the disagreement between the calculated and measured data occurs mainly due to the RELAP5 low void condensation rate which seems to be questionable during rapid transients.