Engineering topics

Seker, V.

Publications and source records attributed to Seker, V..

6 records

DOE OSTI2022

Verification of the AGREE and Serpent for the steady state HTR-10 benchmark problems

This paper provides results from steady state HTR-10 benchmark calculations performed using AGREE and Serpent that are compared to experimental results as well as calculations performed by INET. The purpose of completing this benchmark is to validate AGREE and Serpent for the prediction of HTGR operation so that they may ultimately be used to support licensing and deployment efforts of advanced reactors. The benchmark consists of several problems ranging from control rod worth calculations to k{sub eff} calculations at various temperatures. Overall, AGREE and Serpent show good agreement with the reference solutions and are effectively able to predict HTGR operation for a variety of steady state cases. The largest difference from the reference was for the initial core single rod worth, which is possibly due to the larger core helium cavity causing inaccuracies in the diffusion calculation whereas the control rod worth determined by Serpent and AGREE is much closer to the reference result for the full core loading. Moreover, in every benchmark problem, increasing the number of energy groups in the cross sections results in improved agreement of the AGREE result with the reference, although it also causes an increase in computation time. For problems with experimental data available, the accuracy of results generated by Serpent and AGREE is comparable to results obtained by other benchmark participants. (authors)

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

DOE OSTI2022

Neutronics and thermal-hydraulics simulation of generic pebble-bed fluoride-salt-cooled high-temperature reactor (gFHR)

The fluoride-salt-cooled high-temperature reactor (FHR) is one type of the advanced reactors and has been attracting great interest from the research institutes and commercial companies in the recent years. However, currently the technology is relatively immature. To facilitate the design and safety analysis of FHRs, Kairos Power published the generic FHR (gFHR) benchmark. In this paper, a hybrid method combining the stochastic code and deterministic code is developed to simulate the gFHR benchmark. Serpent 2 is employed as a few-group cross section generator and the cross sections are applied to the finite difference neutron diffusion code AGREE. A good consistency with the gFHR benchmark is achieved. The agreement between the Serpent 2 results and the AGREE results shows that the hybrid method is applicable to FHRs. The thermal-hydraulics are coupled to neutronics for the steady-state calculations and good agreement between AGREE and SAM is achieved. (authors)

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

DOE OSTI2012

Post-refinement multiscale method for pin power reconstruction

The ability to accurately predict local pin powers in nuclear reactors is necessary to understand the mechanisms that cause fuel pin failure during steady state and transient operation. In the research presented here, methods are developed to improve the local solution using high order methods with boundary conditions from a low order global solution. Several different core configurations were tested to determine the improvement in the local pin powers compared to the standard techniques based on diffusion theory and pin power reconstruction (PPR). The post-refinement multiscale methods use the global solution to determine boundary conditions for the local solution. The local solution is solved using either a fixed boundary source or an albedo boundary condition; this solution is 'post-refinement' and thus has no impact on the global solution. (authors)

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

DOE OSTI2012

Modeling prismatic HTGRs with U.S. N.R.C advanced gas reactor evaluator (AGREE)

A core fluids and heat transfer model has been developed for the prismatic high temperature gas reactor in support of the US NRC Next Generation Nuclear Plant (NGNP) evaluation model. The core fluids modeling relies on a subchannel approach in which the primary coolant flow path through the core region and vertical in-core and ex-core gaps can be modeled as individual subchannels. These subchannels are connected together to represent a three dimensional reactor. An initial validation calculation for the core fluids model has been performed using data available in literature for bypass flow. The predicted bypass flow was within 2.6% of the value reported in the literature. The core level heat transfer model is based on a triangular finite volume method, where the base triangle is one sixth of the prismatic block. In order to improve the spatial accuracy at this level, a triangular refinement method was also implemented. The fuel compact temperature is calculated by a cylindrical conduction model which is implicitly coupled to the triangular core level model. The preliminary verification of the model was performed by comparing AGREE to a finite element code COMSOL by analyzing the MHTGR core heat transfer. Further verification and validation is currently an ongoing effort. (authors)

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

DOE OSTI2012

A Newton-Krylov solution to the porous medium equations in the agree code

In order to improve the convergence of the AGREE code for porous medium, a Newton-Krylov solver was developed for steady state problems. The current three-equation system was expanded and then coupled using Newton's Method. Theoretical behavior predicts second order convergence, while actual behavior was highly nonlinear. The discontinuous derivatives found in both closure and empirical relationships prevented true second order convergence. Agreement between the current solution and new Exact Newton solution was well below the convergence criteria. While convergence time did not dramatically decrease, the required number of outer iterations was reduced by approximately an order of magnitude. GMRES was also used to solve problem, where ILU without fill-in was used to precondition the iterative solver, and the performance was slightly slower than the direct solution. (authors)

22 GENERAL STUDIES OF NUCLEAR REACTORS↗

DOE OSTI2012

Validation of the U.S. NRC NGNP evaluation model with the HTTR

The High Temperature Test Reactor (HTTR) was modeled with TRITON/PARCS. Traditional light water reactor (LWR) homogenization methods rely on the short mean free paths of neutrons in LWR. In gas-cooled, graphite-moderated reactors like the HTTR neutrons have much longer mean free paths and penetrate further into neighboring assemblies than in LWRs. Because of this, conventional lattice calculations with a single assembly may not be valid. In addition to difficulties caused by the longer mean free paths, the HTTR presents unique axial and radial heterogeneities that require additional modifications to the single assembly homogenization method. To handle these challenges, the homogenization domain is decreased while the computational domain is increased. Instead of homogenizing a single hexagonal fuel assembly, the assembly is split into six triangles on the radial plane and five blocks axially in order to account for the placement of burnable poisons. Furthermore, the radial domain is increased beyond a single fuel assembly to account for spectrum effects from neighboring fuel, reflector, and control rod assemblies. A series of five two-dimensional cases, each closer to the full core, were calculated to evaluate the effectiveness of the homogenization method and cross-sections. (authors)

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗